


The Feedback System

by beepish



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Barstool Therapy, Canon? Haven't heard that name in years...., Customer Service, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Modern Character in Thedas, Modern Girl in Thedas, Multi, Multiple Relationships, eventually, gimme feedback but understand this is for me, i'm writing most of this stoned as shit, mcit is an elf AND it's explained
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:54:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 51,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23694970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beepish/pseuds/beepish
Summary: Maybe Solas just needs a gin-and-tonic and a good therapist. Shit, do they have gin in Thedas? Note to self: Discover and then ferment juniper berries.Wait, do they have tonic?In which I slowly tear this meta apart, limb from limb.
Relationships: Original Nonbinary Character & Solas, Original Nonbinary Character/TBD
Comments: 91
Kudos: 210





	1. This Is Fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> g'morning sleepyhead!

If it weren’t for the ceiling made of white marble, Mar would’ve thought she’d woken up in her southeast Portland apartment. After all, that’s where she went to sleep last night.

That’s using the term “night” loosely. The birds were the first sign that she had been up too late. The grey dawn was dim enough that she could pretend she hadn’t started playing video games the moment she got home from closing the bar. She distinctly remembered thinking to herself, _Eh, I’m not in again ‘til Tuesday,_ before playing long enough to hear her roommate get up and go to her day job. And then, she…

She woke up here.

Mar slowly turned her head on the feather-down pillow beneath her. She was in a small room made entirely of white marble, lying on a velvet-lined mattress in a wall nook. It sat opposite the door, beside which a candle lantern hung, lit with a pale green flame. The immaculate white sheet laid over her body was smooth, free of any creases. She was used to sleeping in the nude. She wasn’t used to waking up to anything other than a tangled mess of blankets and her curly brown hair stuck to her cheeks, sticky with drool.

She also wasn’t used to feeling so much of the soft pillow against her ear. Or the chill that brushed over her head.

Her hand flew up, bringing to light the stiffness of her limbs. The tips of her ears were much broader and longer than she remembered, and her hair had been shorn nearly to her scalp.

Slowly, she inhaled. Then, she exhaled.

 _Okay,_ she thought. _Maybe I_ do _need to take a break from video games for a bit._

She’d had vivid dreams before, but none with such sharp clarity. Mar pulled the thin sheet off of her, confirming visually the feeling of being naked underneath it. Other than the excess of ear and the lack of head hair, so far, her body was unaltered. She still had her lip and nose piercings. Even her favorite freckle, the little one on her right palm where it met her pinky, was there.

She stretched in bed, bending her knees towards her, sitting up and curling forward far enough to feel a succession of several cracks up her spine. She groaned as she worked out the kinks in every joint she could, swung her feet to the ground, and stood up.

The bed had an imprint from where she was laying in it. She twisted her torso side to side, still working through her back muscles. There was an armoire nestled in another nook beside the bed. Inside was an outfit amounting to a long-sleeved white undershirt, a belted brown tunic, and leggings, along with a hooded wool cloak and sturdy boots. Everything was made of leather and thick linen, designed for practicality over prettiness. Still, they were comfortable and fit well enough. Mar just silently thanked whoever put them there. She plucked a lantern from the wall and left the tiny chamber.

She opened the door down a long, narrow hallway and came to a similar room, only this one was empty, save for a single-door hardwood cabinet against the right wall. It was unlocked, revealing a full archery set. The bow itself was hanging by its string, a rather beautiful, curved longbow with a circular blue orb embedded in its grip. It was even left-handed, fortunately for her.

Mar had taken archery lessons at various Girl Scout camps throughout the years. It wasn’t much to go off of, but, fuck it, archery was cool, and this was _her_ fantasy dream (that had definitely started to feel less and less like it was really dream), goddammit. She delved deep into her memories of the all-girls camp she’d begged her mom to send her to so long ago, trying to recall any bits of information she could.

Carefully, she stood in the position the camp counselor had shown them. None of the bows she’d shot before had been so… impressive. Or authentic. The draw weight had to be at _least_ fifty pounds. There was no way she’d be able to restring it easily, let alone fire it or—

When she gave a first tentative push on the wood, it bent willingly under her not-exactly-muscular arm. It surprised her, causing her to nearly lose her grip and let the top part of the bow smack her in the nose. Either she was stronger than she looked, or this bow was deceptively pliable.

 _I’ll figure that out later,_ she thought. _Where the hell_ am _I?_ This room didn’t have a door so much as a small tunnel to squeeze herself and her pilfered goods through. Right in front of the opening was the back of a tall structure covered in cloth, which she sidled out from behind and around into a large cavern.

She glanced around, somehow being able to make out a few pillars, a long table, and other stone structures beyond the gleaming lamplight. All was in ruins. The high ceiling had a wide, perfectly round hole in the center of it that continued into nothingness. Down the steps and across the debris-strewn room, she spotted another pale green light.

Her echoing footsteps were the only sounds to be heard as she made her way forward, finding an entryway next to flickering green flames. She followed a stairwell up several flights before turning into a dark, earthy tunnel that sloped upwards still. Grey-blue light began to filter in as she approached what she hoped was the way out.

Her heart leapt when she at last came to the mouth of the tunnel. Weak daylight shone through a hefty curtain of vines, situated behind some sort of glowing blue wall. Its translucent surface was strangely iridescent and cold to the touch.

Mar paused, seeing no openings or cracks in the wall. She glanced at her lantern. The candle hadn’t lost any wax, although the soot-black wick suggested prior use. She slid up the latch and removed the candle. The flame itself gave off almost no heat, feeling only as warm as the finger she stuck directly through it. With no better ideas coming to mind, Mar shrugged and tipped the polite flame towards the glassy barrier.

Like fire meeting ice, the candle hissed, extinguishing as it melted a hole clean through. The gap expanded, shrinking the wall into a thin border around the opening. She left the now flameless candle and lantern there, seeing no more use for them, before parting the vines and stepping through.

A chill fell over her immediately. Grey light washed over the outside terrain, marked with tired, drooping trees and murky pools. The cave was situated within a hillside, hidden almost entirely by wild brush and flora. Beyond the thicket, a marshy land stretched into heavy fog, cutting her visibility short.

Mar chanced a look backward through the vines, only to see the blue wall slowly reforming. She kept the string loose as she knocked an arrow, her bow down but at the ready. There was no going back, and stopping wasn’t an option. If she stopped moving, she might have to take inventory of reality, and she wasn’t sure she could handle that right now. Lacking options, she followed a small footpath out of the thicket and onto a wider dirt road in the marsh.

As she continued her journey to… hopefully somewhere, Mar’s anxiety grew. Howls echoed in the foggy distance, growing neither closer nor farther, but remained nonetheless unnerving. She stayed away from the treeline, hoping the fog would keep anything dangerous from seeing her. She had no way to avoid anything that could smell her, and she’d rather be surprised at a distance than right next to a coyote hiding in a bush.

This _could_ just be a dream. Maybe it was one of those ones that only ended if she died in it, and that’s why she couldn’t seem to wake up. On the slim chance that she _wasn’t_ dreaming, though… that she was actually living in the only fictional world she knew of that had green fire, magical barriers, and genuine elf ears? That she was now in plausible danger of getting stabbed with a sword or mauled by a werewolf? Of dying in a universe that wasn’t her own? That she was starring in one of those multiverse fanfictions, except that it was _real_ and she was _living it?_

Her only comfort was that she at least _knew_ this universe. If she were dropped into most other fictional verses, she would probably be screwed.

 _Not like I’m any less fucked if this_ is _Thedas,_ she thought. _I can’t just reload a save if I get served fireballs for breakfast._

Mar’s mind continued to swirl as she spent the next few hours walking. Existentialism aside, she at least knew she had to find food, water, and shelter. It didn’t matter what universe this was if she was just gonna die of exposure anyways.

A rustle in the brush startled her. Her bow was up and ready to fire as she whipped around, heart rate spiking. The tremble in her elbow reminded her that she was severely underskilled. A child at the beginner’s level of swordplay would pose a fair fight against her. But here she was, in the wilderness, trying to believe that she had any chance of defending herself.

Seconds passed and nothing more sounded from the misty treeline. Slowly, she relaxed her arms. Mar pulled her cloak closer to her as she started moving forward again. If she let herself get lost in her thoughts as easily as she could back home, she might not have the privilege of living long enough to die of exposure, after all.

The first instance of homesickness surfaced. She’d only moved to Oregon a few years ago, but she existed as if she’d been born there. Everything there suited her so well. She missed the Willamette River, the bridges, Forest Park. She missed taking her roommate’s three-legged pitbull, Tippa, out for hikes on her days off. The longer she walked through the marsh, the more real everything became. She supposed the only reason she wasn’t having a full-blown panic attack was the numb dissociation that had gotten to her first.

Could this truly be her new reality? If it was, then seriously, how did she even fucking _get_ here?

Despite herself, she wandered back into the whirlwind of her head again.

If she hadn’t, maybe she’d have seen the ambush coming.

When a shadow appeared in the fog right in front of her, Mar barely had time to gasp a swear before a set of burly arms trapped her in a bear hug from the rear. They pinned her arms to her sides, rendering her only means of defense useless.

 _“Shit!”_ She wheezed, writhing between the two pale, muscular arms crushing her. Like hell she’d go down without a fight. If she was gonna get murdered within hours of stepping foot in what could quite possibly be Thedas, she was gonna kick and scream the whole way. Make it theatrical, in case this showed up in one of the books or something. “Let me _go!”_

The figure ahead emerged from the wall of mist. She was dressed in patchwork furs and leathers, bundled head to toe like her big beefy friend currently squeezing the life out of Mar. The mask covering her head looked halfway between a weasel and a wolf. With a lance aimed at Mar’s heart, she lifted her mask slowly. Underneath was a youthful face the color and complexion of deep, rich amber, save for a bright scar crossing over her nose from dark hairline to cheek. She barked something in a rough voice, first at Mar, and then at her counterpart.

Finally, the arms let up on the pressure, although they didn’t let her go. A quick glance back revealed no more than a bear mask and the incredible height advantage this one had on her. Wolf-Weasel regained her attention by moving in a little closer and speaking to her.

The words that poured out of her mouth were not English. The rhythm felt similar, but the syllables sounded closer to German, or maybe Irish. Still, whatever language Wolf-Weasel was using processed in Mar’s mind as if she’d learned it at a young age.

“What are you doing this far south?” she asked. When Mar didn’t respond, she continued, “Are you lost? Or just dumb?”

“I’m…” she said in English. “...Yes? What?”

“Maybe both?” Bear said in the unfamiliar tongue. Her voice was low and smooth as silk.

Mar’s head was fried. Her grip on reality was already paper-thin, and now that she was comprehending a language she was sure she’d never heard before in her entire life, it disintegrated completely.

She dropped her weapon and burst out laughing, which quickly turned to sobbing.

Her two captors didn’t respond at first. Wolf-Weasel lowered her weapon and stepped back, concerned but mostly confused. Bear went from locking Mar in a vice grip to supporting her entire weight as she crumpled into the large woman, full-on ugly crying.

She missed her apartment. She missed her bar. She missed feeling comfortable and secure with all the danger playing out on a screen, fictitious and safe.

Before she knew it, Bear had gathered her and her bow up in her buff as fuck, I mean absolutely _shredded,_ arms and started walking with Wolf-Weasel. They were talking in another language, the one Wolf-Weasel had first used, while she sniffled and let herself be carried to God-knows-where.

 _I guess I should get used to saying “Maker-knows-where” and shit,_ she thought, slowly drifting off as the exhaustion truly settled in. _Don’t want people thinking I’m a weirdo or anything._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i just want to make it to four chapters with this one, bc i wanna do my other ones but i lose steam after three
> 
> thank you for reading! backlogged just a little, will update soon!  
> thanks aunt rona


	2. Welcome to the Neighborhood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i'm pretty much winging this with a vague skeleton of events that lead to an as-of-yet undecided ending, so bear with me lmao

As it turns out, the best treatment for a mental breakdown was a seat by the hearth, a belly full of roast duck and watercress, and a large pelt draped over the shoulders.

Fionna ate beside her, bear mask resting on her lap. Hers was the first face Mar woke up to inside one of the stilted houses in the Chasind village. She and Ainauch had pinned her for a lost elf having undergone some stressful event, which covered for her initial speechlessness and dazed behavior.

Although the language was new to her, it didn’t feel like it. Words and phrases manifested in Mar’s head as if, again, she were already fluent in it. She had to assume she was speaking in the King’s Tongue - or Trade Tongue, or Common, whichever you prefer - while the one Fionna and Ainauch spoke between themselves and the rest of their tribe was Chasind.

“You’re in luck,” Ainauch said, returning from the brief meeting she’d called with a higher-up. “There’s a trading group of Dalish arriving in the morning. They’ll be able to bring you back to their clan.”

“Maybe they’ll be able to help you get in contact with your own,” Fionna offered in between bites.

Ainauch stood behind her partner, running her fingers through her lover’s intricate cornsilk-yellow braids, undoing them. “She’s already said she doesn’t have one, love.”

“Right. I keep forgetting, what with the…” Fionna cleaned off the thigh-bone, motioning with her other hand towards Mar’s face.

As it turned out, there _was_ something different about Mar’s body that she hadn’t been able to see prior to using a mirror.

The sight of it was jarring, at first.

Her face was etched with tattoos like _vallaslin,_ but the design didn’t resemble any of the ones she knew of. Pale filigree ran over her cheeks, down her nose, through her temples, and from her forehead, over her scalp, and down the nape of her neck. The ink carved paths down her spine and across her upper back, but no further. Like the surgical steel of her facial jewelry, they glinted in the right light, contrasting her brown skin even further.

“They’re not Dalish,” Mar responded carefully. Her confidence grew the more she used Trade Tongue. It still wasn’t a bad idea to keep speaking to a minimum.

“So, what, were you a favorite victim of some sadistic Northern nobleman? Is that why we found such a pitiful thing hiding out in the Korcari Wilds?” She leaned into Ainauch’s touch. It would’ve been comical to see such a large woman melt so completely for a much less impressively-statured one if it didn’t fill Mar’s whole chest cavity with warmth.

Mar blinked as her gaze unfocused, fell to the ground beside the campfire, and then to the last bit of meat on the golden brown wing in her hands. “Something like that.”

Thankfully, the matter was dropped. Fionna and Ainauch began speaking with themselves about other current affairs in the life of two Chasind hunter-wives. A few other Chasind came to sit with them, but there were few people living in this particular town to begin with. It was more like an outpost of the local Chasind tribe. The population was mostly made up of tradesfolk and laborers, not so much of families. Situated just southeast of Ostagar, it was a common travel point for the Dalish elves who now occupied the ancient fortress.

It was unbelievable how much information Mar gleaned just from knowing this much. She _knew_ these games, at least as well as any other fanfiction writer would. She’d spent countless hours scouring the Internet for different takes on the lore and all sorts of meta discussion. If elves were living at Ostagar, then that means the Fifth Blight already ended and that the Hero of Ferelden was an elf.

Mar didn’t know anything else about the Warden — What was their name? What were they like? Were they alive or dead, and therefore, did Morrigan conceive Baby Boy Urthemiel or not? — and neither did she know how long after 9:30 Dragon it was. She couldn’t see any ominous green glow of a Breach in the night sky, so it was either before or after the events of Inquisition.

 _Okay, so it could either be 9:31-9:40 Dragon or 9:42 Dragon-infinity. Cool, that narrows it down by at_ least _negative infinity. I think._

She was almost sorry that Thedas was getting _her_ of all people on Earth. For a moment, the thought that she had nothing to offer this world pained her. She wasn’t gonna revolutionize healthcare, challenge the sciences, or invent “indoor plumbing” or “penicillin _._ ” This universe was getting a mentally-ill art school dropout who worked in a dive bar, sometimes forgot to eat, and cried over _video games,_ and, well… It just seemed like everybody got a little shafted, was all.

Sure, she could use her vast wisdom of Dragon Age lore to meddle in the affairs of ancient elves or Titans or whatnot, but there was so much that came with even _thinking_ about doing so. If she was in a place to change a chain of events, would doing so alter the future, rendering her current knowledge null and void? Would she be morally obligated to save people that would otherwise perish, or would she end up just doing more harm than good?

And just how far could she get without getting _literally_ murdered, which was now a _far_ more likely scenario?

There was no player-character-immunity here. She was not marked essential. No save points. She didn’t have the comfort of knowing there was a game to beat, no pre-written promise of a satisfying end to the storyline.

She had to figure out what to tell people about herself. Was there any way to explain multi-universe theories without sounding completely bonkers? Making something up might work, unless someone decided to do any amount of digging. If she was caught straight-up lying, no doubt that’d land her in serious shit. Better to be considered harmlessly insane than even remotely suspicious to anyone with enough interest to fact-check.

Unless she could lie without getting caught… Best way to do that was to survive long enough to get the hell— or rather, Void back to Earth. Quickly, though. The longer she stayed, the more trouble she could get in. She’d keep a low profile and specifically _not_ get caught up in timeline-sensitive events, of course, but basic life preservation was her highest priority. Hiding an inconceivable secret backstory was much lower on the list, honestly.

Someone handed her a tankard of something from a barrel, which turned out to taste a lot like barleywine. It wasn’t typically her first choice of beverage, but the burning bitterness was a familiar, welcome sensation.

She resolved to stick with half-truths and vague deflections. She hated lying, but she couldn’t realistically see herself surviving via honesty. After all, if Solas — a character she has both read and written about _extensively_ — could do it, then she could.

Probably.

She wondered briefly where he might be, and took a long drink.

* * *

Mar woke from a dreamless sleep several times throughout the night, heart racing. No doubt a mix of anxiety and her nocturnal sleep schedule was keeping her from quality rest. She tried not to think about how the following days were bound to suck, but man, they were gonna _suck._

She was allowed to keep her bow and arrows on her as she wandered the outpost in a dazed search for breakfast. It was clear from yesterday that she had no skill in archery, and therefore posed negligible threat. She didn’t care about that right now. Being armed somehow just made her feel safer in general.

The village was only about as big as a generic shopping plaza with like a Trader Joe’s, a Michael’s, and six constantly changing retail spaces in it. The boarding cabins sat on the other end of the settlement from the hearth hall, which doubled as a dining area and assembly space. In between laid sparse craftshops and farming lots. Their shaman onsite resided in the middle of town, in a hut built of living trees bending and weaving together to form walls and a central chimney. White smoke constantly poured out of it, settling comfortably above the layer of ever-present mist.

The warm dining hall was sparse with the other late risers of the village. Two Chasind men were by the communal hearth, passing out servings of rice cakes, dried fish, and cranberries. Most of the others were present. None seemed to pay her much mind. As she ate groggily by herself, she continued listening in on the conversations around her. It was easy to do, considering her still-weird-to-be-reminded-that-they’re-there elf ears.

 _“Yes, it_ has _been a bountiful harvest.”_

_“Will you be heading out soon?”_

_“Your uncle’s doing well.”_

_“That’s the fifth time in a month…”_

Her ears perked up — she briefly wondered if that was a noticeable motion now — at the sound of Ainauch’s scratchy voice. She and Fionna had entered the hall together, scanning the room. For her, apparently, as once Ainauch spotted her, she smiled, grabbed Fionna’s dramatically larger hand, and made a beeline for her.

“So.” The two of them sat across the table from her, Ainauch leaning forward. “Raven came this morning. Dalish aren’t coming.”

“What happened?” Mar asked.

“The clan’s fine,” Fionna reassured her. “There was another skirmish near Ostagar, so they took in the survivors. They have limited resources and couldn’t spare the bodies to guide a trading aravel down here.”

“So we’re taking our own trading carts to them,” Ainauch said, rising. “Be ready in twenty minutes.”

She didn’t risk asking who was fighting in these skirmishes. The two of them were treating it like common knowledge. It would’ve been weird to ask, and she’d likely find out at Ostagar anyways.

When she saw them again, they were wearing face paint instead of masks. Oxen with a sort of wooly coat pulled several carts loaded with various Chasind-made goods. The most popular export was the barleywine she’d had last night, which she learned was called wildwine. She vaguely recalled reading about it on her deep lore dives in the wiki and beyond.

The only reason she knew so much about this world was because of how much she’d played and read about it in all her efforts to stave off mind-numbing boredom. When she was a barista at a teeny café before she moved to Portland, weekdays would be slow as shit and she’d end up writing fic on her phone most of the time. Her city bartender job kept her much busier, thankfully. At that point, she’d written enough to fill a novel, but still never posted anything outside of a few ficlets here and there.

As she walked north along with the Chasind traders, she wished badly for something to write with. Whether it was fanfiction, essays, songs, _whatever_ — writing was her favorite coping mechanism outside of painting and singing. And smoking. And drinking.

 _God. Or, fuck—_ _Maker, Creators,_ whatever, _at least there was still drinking here._

Nobody really spoke with Mar along the way. She kept her hood up and her cloak close around her to stave off the biting chill of the mist, but she worried if that made her seem unapproachable. It made her feel even more out of place than she truly was, much more than any of them realized. By the time they arrived at the Dalish clan some two hours later, she was surprised at the longing for familiarity resurfacing.

If she squinted, the trees and grass lining the path to the gate could have been a secret trail in Astoria. And the sea of pointed ears could have been a _Lord of the Rings_ convention.

And the white deer with helix-shaped horns in that pen over there could just be weird goats.

The Dalish population at Ostagar — a boon granted to the elven Hero of Ferelden — wasn’t exactly metropolitan, but it was certainly enough to fill a village. Aravels had been converted into stabilized huts on mini stilts, echoing Chasind architecture. Remnant stone buildings from the OG Tevinter days were also put to use as storage and other facilities. Everywhere, the bustle of a thriving clan filled the old ruin with brand new life. Even amidst her persistent depression, Mar had to smile.

She helped the Chasind unload their carts in a space adjacent to the stationed trading aravels. The elves were regarding her and her tattoos, specifically. Lots of them were adorned with a colorful array of designs, although none had the same design or strangely metallic ink as her. She just treated them with polite friendliness. The initial transitional shock had started to wear off. She felt more like herself than she had since arriving, snacking on bread rolls and chatting with Chasind humans and Dalish elves alike at the makeshift market.

It was a lively scene. The Dalish sold several types of fur and leather, various armor and weaponry, and a colorful selection of handmade jewelry and tapestries. Both sides shared their takes on local cuisine — seasoned venison jerky, mixes of grains and nuts, freshly-picked berries. She even saw a small box charmed with a cold rune filled with... milk? That was ice cream. Thedas had ice cream.

The only thing she took more seriously than her booze was her food, and sugar was her specialty. Her dad always swore she got that ravenous sweet tooth from his own father, as neither he nor her mom were ever as big on dessert as she was.

Maybe this wasn’t such a bad place to be trapped in. Just because she had only seen the bad parts from the video games and books didn’t mean there were _no_ good things at all. There were bound to be more similarities than differences between the two universes, so little things like ice cream would find their way into existence somehow.

Maybe everything wasn’t bound to suck forever, after all.

“Excuse me, are you the elf the Chasind found?”

Mar turned after a second, realizing she was the one being addressed. There was an elven woman, standing an inch shorter than Mar but carrying herself like she was Fionna’s height. Her ears were long, slender. She dressed in a lighter fashion than most around her. The staff holstered to her back, its tip adorned with a pearlescent rock cradled in cherrywood, signaled that she was a mage.

The second they made eye contact, the elf’s brow furrowed just a bit, as if taken aback by her face. She wasn’t sure if the tattoos flagged her as “A Fellow Dalish” to them, or if they’re so obviously _not_ vallaslin that it would be laughable to mistake it as such.

“Yes,” she said. “My name is Mar. I’m… told you can help me. Somehow.”

The elf woman’s frown disappeared as she straightened her back, smoothing back her pristinely combed dark blonde hair. “Somehow, indeed. I am Keeper Lanaya. We welcome your visit to our new home in this ancient place.” And then, in an entirely different language, _“This place is a place of peace, brother of my blood.”_

Two things happened in the same split second. One, Mar connected this real, living person standing in front of her to an NPC from the very first Dragon Age game. She looked vaguely similar to her in-game design, but came with all the real blemishes and distinctions that came with being a _real, living, breathing_ person. The recognition hit her, but she didn’t dwell on it.

The second was that she understood the Elvhen language as the literal translation before what was actually said. _An’daran atish’an, lethal’lin._ Not only that, but she knew the proper response as if she’d uttered it a thousand times before.

She inclined her head respectfully towards the Keeper, and the Elvhen words tumbled out of her mouth. _“I’m blessed to be in your good graces, Elder.”_

It did little to settle the wariness in Lanaya’s eyes, although her lips curved into a delighted smile. “Whenever you’re ready, come see me in the public house on the east side of the bridge. It’s right across from the infirmary.”

Lanaya made her way towards the bridge in question. Mar noted that the sun did not, in fact, rise in the west here, judging by its steady ascent on that end of the sky. Were there still two moons? Was this an alternate universe, or just some planet in a different corner of the same one as Earth?

Those answers might forever elude her, so Mar didn’t worry too much about them. What she _did_ worry about was how to explain her presence in this world, let alone in the Korcari Wilds. She’d come up with some ideas the night before. None felt solid enough.

 _Let’s think realistically,_ she thought, well-aware of how unrealistic the overall situation was. _I’m a young elven girl with strange tattoos wandering the Wilds._ She paused, and almost slapped herself. _And knows Dalish lingo, AKA the Elvhen language._ That would’ve been a good one to keep under wraps. Who could believably know how to respond to an elder if they’re not Dalish themselves? Someone who was probably smart enough not to get lost in the Korcari Wilds.

Or someone who had been _associated_ with someone that smart. Maybe…

Man. She hoped this would work.

* * *

Her farewells to Ainauch and Fionna were short but warm. She expressed her gratitude for their help, they wished her luck, and she headed across the bridge towards a waiting Lanaya.

Ostagar was a lot bigger than a dev could depict in-game — especially for a game that came out just before 2010. Still, some landmarks looked similar to what she remembered. She was fairly certain that staircase she’d passed was the one you took to find Alistair. There had been a merchant dude making bigoted remarks about elves standing next to it in the game.

She smiled. Now there were elves _everywhere_ here, and they were _thriving._

Crossing the bridge, a massive tower stretched into view, the top of which was mostly obliterated. The Tower of Ishal. Mar looked up at it in awe. That was where Flemeth saved The Warden and Alistair. Out of all the renowned places she didn’t think she’d get to see in her lifetime, she _really_ didn’t think she’d see one like this.

“One like this” meaning “fictional,” but this time it was all too real. All the people around her were real. She walked past an elven man carrying two infants in body harnesses — one in front and one on his back — and a woman lifting a basket of linens on her hip — classic. She’d seen the same thing back on Earth, and _that_ was real.

Existential despair firmly bottled up, safely unexamined, was key. Sure, some things were different. But this made-up world might as well exist, and she might as well have ended up here. Somehow.

Confirming that any more crises were sealed deep, deep, _deep_ down inside, she reached the other end of Ostagar. The buildings were a little more rooted here than simply converted aravels. Groups of little houses huddled together in circles. Gardens laced through crumbling Tevene walls, joining and rejoining around pillars and broken staircases. She kept walking, admiring the curved wood architecture while also trying to find the meeting spot. What she wouldn’t give for a map marker…

A signpost finally pointed her down the right path. _Oh good, I’m literate,_ she thought, staring at the text she’d never seen before but could nevertheless somehow read. _This sure isn’t getting any less weird yet. Hope it keeps up!_

The infirmary was one of the larger buildings on the wide gravel path she followed. True to her word, the public house was straight across from it. The end of the street, however, held the only building made of stone, the biggest by far. Wolf statues perched by the entrance, making it look suspiciously like a temple.

Curiosity got the best of her. She walked up the staircase and stood at the open double doors, glancing at the wolf statues. Daylight streamed through the sunroof. There were elves inside, knelt on the floor, heads bowed solemnly. No one minded when she entered and started wandering.

The walls were lined with statues; there were three on the left mirroring three on the right, plus two sitting on the far side of the long hall. The bodies of the ten-foot-tall wooden figures, sculpted from tree trunks, were humanoid, but their heads were depicted as animal skulls. Each of them had dedicated shrines at their bases, holding impressive displays of gifts and offerings. In the middle of each collection was a plaque, inscripted with the titles, prayers, and brief summaries of the Evanuris.

She worked back and forth, finding out which god corresponded to which. June held a hammer, his skull a cow’s, and Sylaise held a lyre, hers a ram’s. Ghilan’nain’s was a halla — naturally, — while across from her was bow-wielding Andruil with a rabbit skull. Furthest from the entrance on the side walls, Dirthamen wore a two-headed raven’s skull, mirrored by Falon’din, wearing an owl’s.

The two remaining sculptures against the far wall were a little taller than the rest. One had an angled, muscular physique; the other’s shape curved softly, full-figured and particularly bosomy. Both of their heads were lovingly-carved skulls of, what she could only assume to be, dragons.

Elgar’nan and Mythal.

She gazed upon them all, starstruck. Regardless of their subject, they were beautiful works of art, crafted out of pure devotion. That was, in itself, something to be admired.

Between the All-Mother and -Father was a glass bookcase housed in an alcove. It was filled wall-to-wall with intricate, handcrafted tomes. Some titles were in Elvhen, but most were in Common. She picked out _“Fables and Allegories,” “Poisons, Potions, and Poultices: A Guide to Herbalism,”_ and _“Lineages of Clans from the Dales and Before,”_ among the titles delicately inscribed on the semi-weathered spines. None were in perfect condition, but looked as if they’d held up for a lot longer than should’ve.

Mar loved books. If she were alone, she’d try to snatch one just to peek inside and see what she could learn. There was so much she _didn’t_ know about this world, coming in as an outsider. Sure, she was aware about certain key events and people, but I mean come on, _“Rituals of Rivain”? “The Abridged History of the Free Marches”?_ There was so _much!_

The keyholes under the handles discouraged her further. She tore herself away, clasping her hands together. She’d probably kept Lanaya waiting long enough.

Before she approached the public house, Mar heard a withered wailing from the infirmary, stopping her cold in her tracks. As she turned, a tall, red-haired woman emerged, carrying two wooden pails. Spotting her, she tossed one of them to Mar, which she caught less than gracefully.

“You, c’mon,” is all she said before marching down the path and turning left. Mar only hesitated for a second before dashing after her.

They quickly came upon a well, and upon drawing the first pail, the woman traded it with Mar’s empty one. She stood there, waiting for a second, but the woman flashed her intense blue eyes and ushered her to go, so Mar turned tail and scampered back down the path.

 _Is someone sick? Hurt? Dying? Thirsty as shit?_ She had no idea what to expect, so she held her breath as she pushed the door open with the back of her shoulder.

It wasn’t pretty.

Someone’s hands were there in time to take the pail of water from her before she dropped it. She regretted the gasp that escaped her upon seeing at least a dozen beds occupied by the wounded. The incredibly, viscerally, mortally wounded. The stench was killer. A number of healers worked their magic on the most severe cases, but there was no shortage of bloody hands and surgical procedures.

The redhead had been on her heel, and nearly toppled into her at the abrupt stop. A quick scramble placed her out of the caretakers’ ways.

Mar exhaled slowly. “Who are they?” she asked aloud, to no answer. As she observed closer from her corner, however, she began piecing it together.

None of the patients were Dalish, although some were elven. Roughly half were still wearing bits of armor, the rest in tattered robes. On a discarded piece of platemail, she recognized the emblazoned sigil of a sword engulfed in flames.

Narrowed down by one more infinity, she was able to place when she had dropped into Thedas — in the full, deadly swing of the Mage-Templar War.

That answered a couple questions, but raised another important one.

How long did she have until the Conclave?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! comments are appreciated, lemme know what you think!


	3. Who Caught Whose Scent, Again?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> repeat after me: i will write for quantity over quality, i will write with speed over accuracy, and i will edit this monster at a later date. this is how we create content - imperfectly, fueled by thc and caffeine, while listening to Bullets by MCR

It was strange, she decided. The initial horror upon seeing so many broken bodies in one room faded, and was soon replaced by fascination.

Mar had never so much as fractured a bone in her life. She liked hiking, but not being one for contact sports saved her many trips to the hospital. She loved medical history, loved the podcasts and museums. That didn’t change the fact the only surgery she’d undergone was wisdom teeth removal.

One pail of cool well water was for a young mage whose arm was wrapped in a gauze-like fabric. One of the healers concentrated on his torso, a gentle white glow emanating from her palms. He was sweating profusely. A nurse removed a folded rag on his forehead, dunked it into the water, and wrung it dry. An air of relief fell over him as the freshened rag was replaced.

The other went to a Templar man laying on his stomach. A medic was in the middle of changing the gauze on his back. He was the one who’d been wailing pitifully. A fresh burn stretched from his hip to the opposite shoulder blade. With the clean water, he was able to clean the wound and apply some form of poultice.

She really hoped the medicine here wasn’t like… fuckin’ dark ages medicine. That was the era when the human race collectively forgot how to do good science all at once. A plague will do that.

Someone took hold of her hand. She nearly jumped, and then realized it was the redhead, tilting her head toward the exit.

Outside, the woman let go of her hand and faced her. “Thank you for your help earlier, and my apologies if I seemed brusque.” Her voice was soft, yet full, with a clear French— er, Orlesian accent. “I’d mistaken you for one of the neighbors, but now I see we’ve never met.”

“Oh, no problem,” Mar said. “It seemed important.”

She smiled, her cheeks a pair of flecked apples, and offered her hand. “I’m Lisa.”

“Mar.” _Oh, good, handshakes are a thing._ She took it, but it was more of a hand-hold than a shake. For a second, she wondered why Lisa’s ears looked strange. Then, she realized— “Oh, wow, I didn’t even notice you were human.”

At first, Lisa was taken aback. Was that a rude thing to say? Thankfully, she stuttered into laughter. “I get that a lot these days. So, what brings you here?”

Mar jabbed a thumb over her shoulder towards the public house. “I’m supposed to meet Lanaya.”

“Oh, you’re the elf the wilders brought!” Lisa said, connecting the dots. “Come then, let’s get a drink. I’m done in there for now.”

Was bringing along company okay? Either way, she was glad the meeting spot was a pub. She nodded and followed the sure-footed woman. It was time to test just how well she could bullshit her way out of a situation. Her track record was in her favor.

The odds, though, most definitely were not.

* * *

The public house differed very little from any old small-town dive. A number of four-person tables littered the lobby. The bar was clean, stocked with a small array of liquors and a few barrels of ale. The familiarity of it all set Mar immediately at ease. There were only a couple occupants at this time of day, so it made finding Keeper Lanaya a lot easier.

She was stationed at a table in the corner. A polite smile graced her face as she greeted them both, raising a small goblet of wildwine.

Mar slid into place across from her while Lisa grabbed a couple drinks. “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long, I was visiting the temple up the street,” she started with. “It’s breathtaking.”

A bit of warmth found its way into that smile. “Isn’t it? We repurposed a lot of obsolete architecture around the fortress to make things feel more… like a home.”

Mar could practically _see_ the fondness radiating off her. She loved her people, and she loved giving them a place to be themselves in. “Do you miss the nomadic life?”

She laughed. “We still travel, whoever wants to, for months at a time sometimes. If we didn’t, how would Ostagar serve as anything but a prison?”

“Fair enough.”

Lisa returned with two tankards full of a pale ale, setting one in front of Mar and taking a seat beside Lanaya. She regaled her with the magnificent tale of how Mar had valiantly carried a pail of water back to the infirmary. The patients were as she thought — fighters on both sides of the Mage-Templar War. Turns out it was _their_ skirmish that interrupted the Dalish’s trading schedule with the Chasind. The two of them briefly discussed the status there. Things were stable for now.

“So,” Lanaya said, returning her attention to Mar. “I’m morbidly curious as to why a lone elf was found stranded in the Korcari Wilds.”

_Okay. Keep it relevant._

“Well, I was an elven scholar’s assistant. We were trying to find some ruins in the Wilds, but a pack of wolves found us first. I got separated from the group. Haven’t seen ‘em since.” She held up her bow, unslung from her back. “But I did find one of our merc’s bow and quiver.”

It was too well-crafted to be a beginner’s bow, and certainly looked stronger than it felt. She was _not_ a marksman, and if she claimed it was her bow, then why was she so _shite_ with it?

Lanaya, her face a calm veneer, leaned forward in her chair. “An elven scholar? Do I know of him? Ah, may I?” Her hand extended, and Mar relinquished the decorated recurve bow for closer inspection.

“Most likely not,” she said. “This expedition was a chance to begin our very first published manuscript.”

The bow went over and over in the Keeper’s nimble hands. She held it flat, fingers pressing on the grip where the blue orb was lodged. It resembled a crystalline marble the size of a golf ball clipping right through the center. Then, Lanaya returned it with mild disinterest. “And did you find it? The ruins you were searching for.”

She shook her head, casting her eyes downward.

“This scholar,” Lisa said, bringing her tankard to her lips. “What did he look like?”

When Mar pictured someone who looked like an elven scholar, there was only one face that came to mind. “Tall. High cheekbones. Bald. Couple scars on his face.” _Fuck my life, that’s not vague._

A Look was exchanged between Lanaya and Lisa. Mar’s stomach twisted, knowing that Look meant something she couldn’t understand without context. Oh God— Creators? Maker? She fucked up. Her eyes flicked between the two of them as they looked back at her.

“An elven man fitting that description emerged from the Wilds not two days back,” Lanaya said. “He was disheveled and weak, but still wouldn’t stay longer than a night. Saying he had important business to take care of elsewhere.”

Mar’s eyes went wide. “Did he give you his name?”

“Solas.”

The wide smile, precursor to a laugh, appeared before it could be stopped. Maybe the odds _were_ in her favor. But, of course. Of course he’d be so close, yet so far. Of course he wasn’t here anymore. He was maybe the only person alive who could help her get back to Earth, if she was willing to risk being slapped with a “Knows Too Much” label and promptly decapitated. Okay, maybe without the ultraviolence. He wasn’t a monster.

Although, there was no guarantee that his character was exactly like the one portrayed in the games. She’d have to meet him to find out.

“That bastard.” Mar was hoping the grin on her face came across as relieved instead of the bewildered acceptance of terribly unlikely events it truly was. Just another specific emotion she was beginning to feel accustomed to. “Did he say where he was going?”

Lanaya blinked and pressed her lips together. “No. I find it concerning that he hadn’t mentioned losing an expedition group at all.”

Mar’s smile conceded to a puzzled frown. Of course he wouldn’t, because this was all completely fabricated, but the stage was set. All she could do was limit the introduction of players and work with them. “He didn’t mention us… at all?”

“Not once, I’m afraid.” The apologetic wince in her eyes looked genuine.

“He _was_ in a terrible hurry,” Lisa remarked.

Her thumb traced the handle of her tankard. She could hear her high school theater director’s voice as if she was right back on the rented stage. _C’mon, gimme dejected. Your precious scholar abandoned you. Where’s the heartbreak in your face? Show me_ heartbreak! _That’s it! Now think, why would he do this to you? What could’ve been so important that he wouldn’t stop to look for his dear assistant?_

The idea hit her, and she inhaled sharply. “Maybe…” She swallowed, looking up at the two women across from her. “Maybe he found it.”

Lanaya drank from her goblet, placing it back onto the table gently. “The ruins.” When Mar nodded, a spark of excitement ran across the Keeper’s face. “He must have found something quite worth writing about. Still,” she said, deflating, “I wish he’d taken kinder to my people. He should have shared that sort of discovery with us.”

Ah, so he was still horrified by the Dalish. Consistency was a good sign, although she would’ve liked to meet a Solas that didn’t harbor ill prejudices against the very people he was trying to save.

 _No, dumbass,_ she reminded herself, _he’s not trying to save the Dalish. Just the direct ancestors of them. I guess._

As much as she understood him, she also understood his fallibility. The modern elves inhabited the bare bones of what their culture had once been. If Ostagar was now home to the most prosperous elves since the Dales — and that their definition of “prosperity” meant “owns some land and is NOT hunted for sport on it” — then she could understand how the horrific whiplash would cloud a person’s judgement.

That didn’t excuse him from responsibility and reevaluating his stances. But if you napped for a few thousand years and woke up to a cosmic boot in the teeth, you might be a little hasty with your judgments at first, too.

“Where do you think he’d have gone,” Lisa asked Mar, “if he _did_ find something in some ancient elven ruins?”

She chewed on her lip for a moment. “I’m not sure. Where else would they value that kind of knowledge?”

Lanaya’s goblet went bottoms up (hell yeah Lanaya) before she rose from her seat. “You’ve given me a lot to think about, Mar. Thank you for being so forthcoming.”

“It’s no trouble, I’m certainly indebted to you for your hospitality.”

A wave of her hand. “No such thing. Lisa, will you come see me after dusk?”

Lisa nodded, and with that, the Keeper departed. The two of them moved to the bar, refreshing their cups and falling back into discussion.

Beer flowed and time passed, and the two got to talking. Mar learned a lot about this new character she was basically creating on the fly, the lowly assistant to the village scholar. She’d grown up in Amaranthine but moved to Gwaren after the Fifth Blight, where she and Solas supposedly met when she was working, extremely coincidentally, at a tavern. The less she could straight up lie, the less she’d have to keep track, so Mar the Bartender became Mar the Tavern Maid.

Lisa listened attentively, adding in bright remarks and comparisons to her own experiences. She’d never been to Gwaren, but thought Amaranthine was more scenic than Denerim. “Did you want to escape working in a bar?” she asked. “Traveling with an elven scholar sounds _much_ more romantic.”

“Oh, I liked the tavern life well enough,” she said. “I was just more interested in studying Elvhen with him. In exchange, I more or less ran his errands for him. Picking up packages, attending meetings when he couldn’t, laundering and cooking. And I made his drinks, of course. Hates tea, but drinks it to stay up late anyways.”

Lisa pushed her long ginger hair out of her face, undone from the tight bun she’d had it in. “Sounds like you were close.”

Mar shrugged. “Most respectful boss I’ve had. I enjoyed working with him. Though, I guess I’m out of a job, now…”

“Well, I heard the Templars are hiring.”

Mar snorted. “Do I need to explain why that’s a bad idea?”

“Not at all,” she said, grinning. “I should know, I’m a Templar.”

Midsip, Mar raised an eyebrow. “Really?” It wasn’t that Lisa was terribly skinny, but Mar expected more bulk on a sword-fighter. Then again, what did she know about sword-fighting? “You don’t strike me as one.”

“Why, because I’m not in armor or because I’m kickin’ it with the Dalish?”

“Yes.”

She laughed, the sound of it a bell being struck, clear and round. “I suppose I should say I’m _almost_ a Templar. The day I was to begin lyrium was the same day the Chantry in Kirkwall went up in smoke.” The corners of her lips curled delightfully. “I’ve been stuck as a recruit for three years now, and now with the Nevarran Accord annulled, I doubt this war will leave much room for advancement.”

The Nevarran Accord. That left… maybe two years at most until the Conclave. “They couldn’t induct you, like, real quick?”

“Without the Chantry’s stable supply of the glowy blue stuff,” Lisa said, leaning back in her seat, “definitely not. There’s hardly enough to go around for the guys already dependent on it.” She frowned, and a lost look haunted her eyes. “Ah, but if I _had_ been on lyrium, I would’ve won the last skirmish I was in.” As if it was never there, she smiled at Mar. “But then I guess we wouldn’t have met.”

“Wait… You were in a skirmish, just like the people in the infirmary right now.”

Lisa nodded, taking a healthy swig. “Sad lot, these ones. But yeah. Me and one mage were all they found alive.”

You know, back on Earth, it was always a sort of fun thing to think about the secret lives of the strangers around you. Sonder, that’s the word. There was no telling what kind of person you’d have a one-time encounter with on the bus. Sometimes, it was both creepy and fascinating to wonder if one had ever unknowingly shared words with someone who had killed another person.

As much as she’d accepted the likelihood of her being murdered in this place, it was another thing altogether for Mar to accept that most of the people she’d talk to here had definitely killed at least one other person. This woman she was sharing a drink with? She had “Killing People, Specifically Mages” in her job description.

“How do you feel about being an almost-Templar?” Mar asked, taking another slow sip of ale.

Lisa shrugged. “It’s better than being an almost-Chevalier. Have one too many disagreements about their methods, and it’s off to the Order for you. It’s hardly more ethical these days, but at least they stand for _something_ besides fabricated honor.”

“You,” Mar said, “have led a very interesting life.”

This got her laughing again. “That’s certainly one way to put it, from the perspective of a tavern maid.”

If only she really _was_ the only one with an interesting life.

* * *

The sun dipped low while Lisa showed her the common boarding house. There were two beds to a room, but with so few visitors at the moment, Mar was able to have a room to herself. Lisa told her where the latrines were — opposite end of camp from the well, naturally — and left her to get some rest. Tomorrow, she was going to show her where she could practice archery.

The ale served was by no means strong and tasted more like water than piss. Mar absolutely could’ve slammed a whole keg back and maybe gotten a little drunk, but letting her guard down was _not_ happening, not yet. Instead, she was mildly buzzed and wondered how she could get ahold of some paper and a writing utensil.

There was one small table with drawers in the corner of her room. Mar checked, but only found some big fuckin’ tooth.

“Oh,” she said aloud. “It’s a canine tooth.”

Through her nose, she breathed in.

A moment passed.

Through her mouth, she breathed out.

_Of course._

Now, the feeling was familiar.

Mar slipped the memento into her cloak’s pocket and left to find a supply vendor or something.

So, Solas was awake. That was… good? Maybe? How long had he been awake? A few months? Days, like her? What was he doing in the Wilds? Did he have his orb, or did he pass it off to Corypheus yet?

What was she going to do about it, anyways? Helping him in his goal was a bad idea. Confronting him about it sounded even worse. She could theoretically save this world one whole apocalypse if she could get an emotionally-traumatized elf to stop trying to succeed.

She laughed at herself. His name was _Pride._ If he were to change, he’d have to admit he was doing something wrong, that his intentions were good but his methods left much to be desired. Shame was the antithesis to everything he stood for. It was what he’d been trying to escape the most.

Meeting him really would help her make that decision, because as it stood, there wasn’t one to make. It was unlikely that she’d find him, but that was starting to mean very little. Nothing was impossible. The thought filled her with as much hope as it did fear.

As she turned a corner, she spotted Lisa disappearing into one of the houses at the end of the street. Maybe she would know where to get paper. Mar headed there, but slowed her steps when she heard another voice pour through one of the open windows. She inched forward, quieter. If she was busy, she didn’t want to interrupt.

“So,” the other voice — Lanaya — said, “nothing?”

“Not a whiff,” Lisa said. The scrape of a chair, the filling of a cup. “Our newest arrival is harmless. No abomination, no demon, nothing.”

Wait, was that in question?

“What’s with that look?” Lisa said after a moment. “I’ve never seen someone so troubled to be told they _didn’t_ just meet a demon.”

 _“Because.”_ Lanaya’s voice was strained. “A demon will wear any face to gain your trust. If that’s not why she looks like that, then what is?”

“Maybe she’s family.”

“It’s not just resemblance, it’s _exactly_ her face. It was like meeting her again, in the flesh, but that can’t be possible.”

What? Whose face?

“Are the tattoos Dalish?” A pause. “Then, what are they?”

She imagined Lanaya shaking her head. “I don’t know. The design looks familiar, but I can’t place it…”

Mar’s hand closed around the tooth in her pocket. The discussion moved on towards the ongoing war, and Mar stole away as swiftly as she could.

Who did Mar look so much like that she’d troubled a powerful Keeper? Was it someone she’d encountered in the games? Or some unnamed, unmentioned person in this woman’s past?

She found her way back to her room and climbed into bed. A remnant of light still colored the sky, but she didn’t care. Mar swam in the sea of endless questions flooding her mind, until all dissolved into static and sleep claimed her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! let me know what you enjoyed in the comments! any thoughts or ideas on where this is headed? i'd love to hear what you think!


	4. Kickin' It with the Dalish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar makes plans with friends.

All was silent save for Mar’s breath coming in slow puffs. Her arms, aching, pulled themselves up, one knuckle on her left cheekbone, her lungs keeping time to the steps on their own accord. The draw, the anchor, and half of her breath held back while the rest escaped.

“Hold,” Mithra said. Another NPC made flesh, and she was everything that Mar expected in a Dalish hunter. Strong, skilled, and proud. “Don’t forget the follow-through this time.”

On her second day in Ostagar, Mar was allowed to shoot a bow. There were plenty of spares at the secluded archery range near the Korcari Wilds gate. She wasn’t going to use the Dalish equipment, but she _was_ going to get to know it all very well. Not having a penny — nope, copper — to her name meant that she’d have to pay for her archery lessons with labor.

Honestly, it was preferable this way. Mithra showed her basic maintenance and the kinds of tools and oils needed to upkeep an entire archery set. She taught two classes a day, rotating groups of about ten bare-faced elf kids each. Mar attended both most days and cleaned the practice weapons after each class. Sometimes, she’d stay late and practice further on her own.

It took three days for the shaking in her elbow to stop being so obvious. After that, her breathing was more finely tuned. Her shots actually started hitting the bale of hay twenty-five yards away. Nowhere _near_ the center of it, but getting them to stick was good enough for her.

Today, they were strengthening her aim by having her hold her breath as long as she could. Get used to the small exhale withheld in her chest. Use the diaphragm. Shoulders stay level. Time the breath. It honestly reminded her of the voice lessons she took in high school.

“Loose!”

_Thunk!_

Mar heaved a sigh. The outer ring, again.

“Hey,” a familiar voice called. “You hit it!”

Being in beginner’s classes full of children, she wouldn’t exactly say she’s made friends with anyone. Still, she loved talking with them. Even otherworldly elven kids said the funniest shit. Mar turned to see Dalyna, a sprout of eight years, standing near the toolshed. She was grinning, mildly-floppy ear to half-up ear. Turns out, it takes until puberty for an elf’s ears to pop; they’re born with them folded. It was weirdly the cutest thing in the world.

“Don’t patronize me!” Mar returned, faux-indignant. That got a laugh. “Need more practice like I do?”

“Actually, my parents wanna invite you to dinner! You wanna come over?”

She gave her best puppy eyes to Mithra, who only smiled and jutted her thickly tattooed chin in the girl’s direction. Thanking her and wishing her a good night, Mar retrieved her arrow and ran off to socialize.

Going back to the whole “hasn’t made friends yet” bit from before, that actually also applied to regular adult friends. The residue of panic coated her insides every time she left her room, so she mostly kept to herself. She felt like she was waiting for something to go wrong, but nothing really had. _(Yet,_ she thought.) She didn’t have anywhere to go — her home had been the road for so long, she’d told them. There was nowhere she needed to be.

 _Other than ‘off this planet,’_ she added inwardly.

There was Lisa, who kept herself mostly busy with infirmary work. She and Mar got together every few nights for food and drinks, but it was hard for Mar not to feel held at arm’s length. She wasn’t sure if it was Lisa being guarded or Mar being scared of the truth coming out accidentally. Or maybe both. Who’s to say?

She’d met a couple other elves she’d originally met on her PS3. Nobody acted out of the ordinary around her. Even Lanaya lost that nervous tension in her shoulders whenever she first made eye contact.

It got easier to exist, slowly. Mar crawled out of her shell after a couple nights. She ate with the Dalish, joined in their celebrations — she even started helping out in the public house, pretty much picking up barbacking shifts. She did that shit for literal years, so at least that meant she was really, _really_ good at it.

Using the barter system for food and things you needed to survive was pretty agreeable to her. She understood, though, that some goods, non-essential stuff and such? Those, it would be easier to pay with coin. It would take a longer time to save enough potatoes for a notebook and pencil than to just work a couple shifts. And potatoes were one of her favorite comforts, so she’d rather just give an artisan money anyways.

Still. Making a couple friends would do her good.

Dalyna’s residence rested in one of the little cul-de-sac sets of houses. A small brick chimney, smoke curling out of it, promised a warm room, and when a young elven woman with hair the same fiery orange as the girl’s opened the door, a rush of the air flooding out confirmed it.

“Oh!” she gasped. Her surprised stare lingered for a second before turning into a welcoming smile. “Is this your classmate, _love?”_ Mar noticed some words in Elvhen weren’t exactly the phrases she’d heard in the games. However, _vhenan_ was the same. It was a more general term of endearment than she’d thought. Adding the _ma’_ prefix gave it the more romantic connotation.

Dalyna introduced her as “Marmar the Elder,” since they’d named a dragonfly “Marmar the Younger” yesterday. For some reason, everyone else in class thought it was hilarious. She wasn’t sure if she didn’t get the joke because she was an alien or because of the generational difference. Probably both. She still laughed with them. Even if she was out of touch, she wanted to be a good sport about it.

The woman introduced herself as Gheyna, and that’s when Mar recognized her. Another Origins NPC. By this time, she was able to lock her expression down to a friendly smile in order to mask any recognition. She had never truly _met_ anyone here. Any indication to the contrary would spell trouble.

Her mind was never that far from reconsidering her stance. She could always come clean, tell people the truth. Avoid the risk of being caught in the lies she built to support her weight. Ultimately, there was no harm in keeping up the façade. She had no ulterior motives; she had no memory of how she got here. There was no harm in protecting your identity if telling the truth had no real consequences.

By that reasoning, there was also no reason _not_ to tell the truth. It wasn’t like she was a very threatening person. Worst case, she wouldn’t be believed, and nothing would change.

There were good reasons, however, to keep that sort of knowledge out of the grapevine. Once it was out, there was no control over who ended up hearing about it. Some people might make the worst case scenario a little worse for her.

When Dalyna’s dad came home from the market, she pretended she didn’t know his name was Cammen and that he was so dumb in love with his wife that he snagged her an extra box of blackcurrants, just because it was her favorite fruit.

Conversation was easy with Gheyna and Cammen around dinner. She liked asking questions about their lives, what it was like being Dalyna’s parents, what they did for a living. The small things were the most interesting. The games could never have shown Gheyna’s passion for jewelry-making in a side quest, but this was Gheyna the Real Live Person and not Gheyna the Quest-Related Side Character. She listened to the story of how they got together, pretended she had no idea they’d met the Hero of Ferelden, and paid attention.

“Of course,” she said, cheeks rosy. “Then came the little one. I suppose you can see now why we named her Dalyna.”

“Because of the Warden?”

“Well, yes.” Cammen returned from putting his daughter to bed. Night had long since fallen, but they insisted that they enjoyed her company. He stood behind his wife, hands resting on her shoulders as she sipped an herbal tea. “Lyna was the Hero’s given name. We gave our child the diminutive as a way of honoring our fellow Dalish’s memory.”

_Yes._

Since she’d arrived at the camp, Mar had been trying the _entire_ time to indirectly learn about the Warden. The topic avoided her like the plague in casual conversation, like no one wanted to talk about her. Now, with the hunter’s use of the past tense, she figured out why.

“Forgive me, I refer to her by her family name more often.” She sipped the cup of tea they’d given her, mildly sweetened with honey, tasting of lemon myrtle and lavender. “Dalyna is a lovely name, really.”

Cammen’s round cheeks dimpled with his grin. He had a major case of babyface, making him look younger than he probably was. He squeezed Gheyna’s shoulder, to which she stroked his hand and smiled at him. Her eyes crinkled at the corners. It was absolutely disgusting to see how smitten they were with each other, even after all this time, and Mar loved to see it. She _always_ made sure they got together whenever she played a non-asshole Warden.

If Mar remembered correctly, Lyna Mahariel was the default name for the female Dalish Warden. All of the ones she’d lovingly crafted, sketched, written drabbles for — did they exist in another universe? Was the ability to customize a whole person just game flavor, or had every player been creating another new universe with another new person every time? New timelines, new sequences of events?

She stopped. Continuing that line of thought was sure to fry her system.

In this universe, the other potential default Wardens had to exist. Whether or not they were alive, or even mattered, was yet another useless train of thought. The Warden was significant because of Duncan showing up when he did. Nobody was destined to be the Hero of Ferelden, it was all just… circumstance.

“My life wouldn’t be what it was if she’d never showed up.” Cammen placed a gentle kiss on the top of Gheyna’s ginger head. “Did you know her well? Before…?”

Mar drank from her cup, shaking her head. “No, I never got a chance to meet her.”

They glanced at each other, eyebrows raising in sync. “Really?” Gheyna said.

“Is that… surprising?”

“No,” Gheyna quickly assured. “Sorry, we shouldn’t have assumed, but, well, you—”

A knock on the door interrupted her, to which Cammen excused himself to answer it. Gheyna asked her how she liked the tea, and Mar expressed her fondness for it and thanked her again.

“It’s for you,” Cammen said to Mar when he returned. His demeanor had shifted to be slightly more guarded. The person at the door was Lisa, the resident almost-Templar. She was unaffected by the Dalish’s wariness around her, waving as she saw Mar.

“Hey,” she said. “Mithra said you’d be here. I know it’s late, but… well, we got something.”

* * *

As she sat with Lanaya and Lisa in the pub again, she reflected on how much more settled into this world Mar had become since they’d first gathered. She’d arrived six days ago like a newborn fawn, hitting the ground running on skittish legs. It took a little while, but she’d adapted. Much faster than she thought she would’ve. Existing felt less like a balancing act and more like LARPing 24/7.

It was its own kind of exhausting.

She stared at the letter in her hands, addressed to “Lisa dM.” from Knight-Commander Tavish in Denerim. They’d kept a regular correspondence since Lisa was saved by the Dalish. The community of Ostagar held healthy relations with the populations of both Gwaren and Denerim, but was considered a neutral party in the Mage-Templar War. There was no rule stating that Lisa had to return, especially considering her non-official status as a recruit.

Except now, Tavish informed her of a new lyrium supply secured by Lord Seeker Lucius, who Mar knew succeeded Lambert. Lisa was invited to return to Denerim and prepare to take her vows. The ceremony would be held the day after All Soul’s Day, on the second of August.

“That’s… incredible news,” Mar said, handing back the parchment. “Are you excited?”

Lisa nodded enthusiastically. “Once my vows are made, I’ll be stationed in the capital to help protect the city. The Knight-Commander has changed his stance on pursuing the rebel mages. He believes the Divine will call a Conclave soon, and he’s averse to needlessly risking anymore lives.”

“Well, good. I’m happy for you.” She had some reservations about _anyone_ getting hooked on lyrium, but she was in no place to advise Lisa otherwise. “What has this got to do with me?”

That’s when Keeper Lanaya produced another letter. “This one came this evening. I have a contact who specializes in magical artifacts, and he says that your scholar came to a store of one of his clients in Denerim a few days ago.”

It was the first they’d mentioned Solas since she’d arrived. Lanaya’s contact had spoken with the proprietor, who said an elf of Mar’s description came in and asked his store clerk about magical items. As far as Mar could tell, he didn’t mention being in possession of an elven relic. Definitely a card he was hiding _way_ up his sleeve.

“So, I’ll be leaving at first light tomorrow,” Lisa said. She leaned across the table, locking her intense blue eyes on Mar. “I’d be more than happy to escort you to Denerim, if you’re inclined to find your scholar.”

“And,” Lanaya added, “I’d like to employ you as an agent of mine. I wouldn’t ask you to betray your former employer’s trust, but…” Her finger traced the rim of her tankard. “If you’re in need of any assistance, I want to be the one to provide it. Any worthwhile knowledge you can pass along is all I ask in return.”

Her heart clenched within her ribcage. Despite her belief that her lying wasn’t a bad thing, it felt scummy to be trusted like this. Mar was a trustworthy person, but the inherent guilt she felt for lying about _anything_ knocked on her mind’s window.

She ignored it. This was okay. This _was_ okay, right? Yeah. Totally.

Because the fact of the matter was, Mar had to do something before it was too late. What “too late” meant, she didn’t know, but she knew her options at the moment: live in this world, or get the fuck out. Change nothing, or change everything. Survive or die.

Some choices were easier than others, some risks smarter. Staying with the Dalish was an option… but then what was she going to do? Wait for the apocalypse? Getting involved with the Inquisition meant safe harbor from this war, but also the potential for unwanted attention. Finding Solas meant a step towards either getting home or getting whacked.

But a step forward was a step forward. It was momentum. Anything was better than staying put. Mar would rather face her fate head-on than sit back and be consumed by it.

Her dark eyes met Lisa and Lanaya’s expectant stares. Nervous boldness broke out as a smile on her face.

“I’ll drink to that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm keeping them short in the beginning, just so i can keep up this kinda posting momentum. There Will Be Two Or Three Arcs So Strap In
> 
> thank you for reading!


	5. Good Smells, Fun Times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar and Lisa hoof it to Denerim.

The next morning, just as promised, Mar and Lisa departed on foot for Denerim. Mar didn’t have that much to pack. The only things she’d acquired since her arrival were the canine tooth, her notebook and pencil, some archery maintenance supplies, and a satchel to carry it all. She ran her hand over her shorn head as she left her little room just before daybreak. She missed her hair, but the time she would’ve spent fixing it in the morning was much better used elsewhere.

At sundown, Mar watched how Lisa pitched the tent, helping where she could and learning how to do it herself. They had one between them, but because they switched off taking watch at night, there was only one person sleeping in it at a time.

Mar took the second watch the first night. She kept her bow strung, arrow at the ready. Lisa warned her that bandits and rebel mages were equally as likely to raid a small camp for any meager supplies. Usually, they only wanted food and money. If you were unlucky enough to attract the attention of the more bloodthirsty-types, you’d better be quick enough to defend yourself.

She had exactly zero faith in her archery skills, but again, it was better than nothing. Just having someone out with a readied weapon was a good enough deterrent against most would-be threats. She chewed on jerky as the early morning hours crawled on. As much as she wanted to use her alone time to scrawl more in her notebook, she dutifully guarded the campsite, stoking the small fire that kept her warm.

On their lunch break, Mar took that as an opportunity to hone her archery. Her aim was getting better. Lisa even started giving her basic defensive training, with lots of rolling, pivoting, and ducking.

As they walked farther north, the air warmed and the mist disappeared. Summertime was in full swing. Mar figured it was about mid-Solace, the seventh month AKA this universe’s July. Her wool cloak eventually got too heavy for the climate, so she opted to use it as a blanket at night instead.

When the sight of Fort Drakon crept upon the horizon, she let out a breath. Sure, she’d known that traveling meant risking her life, but she was very good at ignoring how tense it’d really made her. The immensity of her relief at surviving a three-day journey nearly shocked her.

Hopefully she didn’t need to get used to it. They’d find Solas and she’d get him to magically teleport her back to Earth, and then she could go back to wearing headphones on her short walks to work and back. The view from looking over her shoulder constantly wasn’t that impressive.

They made it to the city gates without fanfare. The swaths of people grew thicker as they approached. Lisa gave the fist-against-her-heart salute to the Templars stationed alongside the Royal Guard. The men in armor returned the gesture, and then one enveloped her in a swift, full embrace.

“It’s good to see you again, sister,” he said, clapping her on the shoulders. Those in the order held genuine affection for each other, akin to siblinghood. The war only brought them closer together as they united against their dreaded enemy of rebellious mages.

She introduced Mar as a friend and traveling companion. She held her tongue regarding her opinions about the war. For now, her safety was more important than making herself an enemy of the military state. At least they didn’t make any remarks about her being an elf. When they swept past the gates and into the city, she didn’t have to wonder why.

It seemed that having the Hero of Ferelden come from Dalish heritage, elves in general were more widely accepted in the city. The ratio of elf-to-human in the population was, of course, not quite as elf-heavy as Ostagar, a literal safe haven for the Dalish. But Denerim was no longer a place run by humans that simply allowed elves to live in a hovel within their city limits. She could plainly see elves living in houses right next to humans, sharing the same market, the same taverns, the same bathhouses.

Mar asked Lisa about the shift as they headed towards the Chantry, citing that it was much more diverse than the last time she visited. (Never specifying when exactly she’d last visited, of course.) Lisa told her how King Alistair and Queen Anora both held great respect for elves, their views being reflected in new laws enacted and old ones revoked. The created offices and organizations, including a retraining of the Royal Guard, to help enforce the laws against hate crime and anti-elf discrimination.

The alienage was still intact, but as so much of it was destroyed in the Fifth Blight, reconstruction had left it unprioritized. Moving the displaced portion of its population into low-occupancy human neighborhoods made a lot more sense than leaving them on the streets. With a move like that, some resistance was expected, met, and swiftly smothered.

A small part of her pumped her fist in the air, thinking about how proud she was of Alistair. He was one of her favorite characters in the series. Everything about him was kind, genuine. It almost made her not want to meet him, for fear of dismantling the image in her head.

Almost. Seeing him as a flawed human would only make her love him more.

Until then, she didn’t have to worry about accidentally running into him. He was a _king,_ and an ultimately popular one at that. If he ever visited this part of town, they’d likely have a few hundred people in between them. Mar hoped with everything she had that she wouldn’t do anything that landed her in the royal district, because the spot she’d most likely end up in was the dungeon, somehow. She could find a way to fuck up that badly, she was sure of herself.

The Chantry cathedral was an admittedly beautiful building. Lisa was right when she said Denerim wasn’t much to look at, but the Chantry obviously had special attention paid to it. Being the birthplace of Andraste certainly came with its perks. Was she remembering that right? She had been painfully uninterested in Chantry lore, except to look into the woman they all worshipped and how she was almost definitely a mage. _Irony, oh, how you agonize me so._

Anyway, the Andrastians went off with the stained glass. People gathered in small groups; they generated a background ambience of the devout reciting passages, burning bowls of offerings, praying to altars full of gifts. All of it accompanied the singing. Someone would sing a small melody, and everyone joined them on a verse.

She thought about one of her mornings at the Dalish village, when she heard an elven woman singing while folding the laundry. She wondered if the pious humans in here knew they were so similar to someone they thought to be so different.

Huh.

How different was _she_ from your average Thedosian, really?

Mar waited on a bench near the door while Lisa spoke privately with Knight-Commander Tavish. She took her secret superpower of invisibility pretty seriously. Sitting by yourself, reading a book of poetry from a nearby bookshelf, was a pretty good way to blend in. If she got stares, it had to be either the ears, the tats, or both. She imagined them thinking she looked strange, but not suspicious, because no one addressed her until Lisa re-emerged twenty minutes later.

“Okay, good news or bad news first?”

“Bad.” Mar always said bad news first so the good news would cheer you back up.

“No vacancy in the Chantry.”

She groaned. “The good news better be good.”

“Taverns rent cheap rooms,” Lisa said, grinning, “especially if you work in ‘em full-time.”

“Work in the taverns or the cheap rooms?” A Chantry sister grimaced as she walked by. Lisa covered her mouth and sputtered, stopping herself from bursting out laughing.

“Up to you,” Lisa said. “But I would suggest the bar if you like free booze. That’s not guaranteed at The Pearl.”

“Well _that’s_ a bummer.”

* * *

Lisa didn’t have anything to do on her first day back, so they both went to find the store Lanaya’s contact mentioned. It’s not like crime had vanished with the new king. Lisa wanted to give her more formal lessons about self-defense before she let her run loose in the streets. The vulnerability radiated plainly off of her, all crossed arms and downcast eyes. Any pick-pocket within ten feet was likely to pin her as an easy target, and they’d be right.

The two of them walked through the lower market district of Denerim, enjoying the late-summer sunshine. The main square was packed with vendor’s stalls, much akin to what Mar had seen in the game, although slightly bigger and more spaced out. If she heard the phrase, “fine Dwarven crafts, direct from Orzammar,” shouted across the din of the crowd though, she didn’t trust herself not to go feral.

People of all ethnicities traveled the cobblestone sidewalks. A few horse-and-carriages manned the roads, but most traffic was on foot. One stall they passed belonged to a brightly-clad woman with black hair and delicate, hooded eyes, speaking Orlesian. The air around her stall smelled strongly of florals and spices. Was that Liselle? Maybe. She’d find out later. Lots of goods jumped out to her — instruments, art supplies, accessories. Eking out a brief living, just so she could pluck on a banjo or draw someone’s portrait, wasn’t such a bad idea.

As much as she tried not to, her eyes constantly scanned the crowd around her, looking for familiar faces. Solas could very well still be in the city. She hadn’t thought a lot about what she’d actually do if she found him. She would rather be able to see him coming, that was certain.

“There’s the Gnawed Noble,” Lisa said as they reached the other side of the marketplace. “Lots of wealthy patrons, good food. Might be a nice place to work, if most lords weren’t such arseholes.”

Mar snorted. Lisa wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. She appreciated that in a person.

The tavern was a quaint sort of house, finely decorated compared to the surrounding ones. Music drifted out of the open windows. Someone knew their way around a fiddle.

They continued north, following the wide street and turning off into a paved sideroad. Small shops lined the way. The one they stopped in front of had a human skull hanging above the sign next to the door.

_The Wonders of Thedas._

Seeing places and meeting people she could recognize was a feeling somewhere between comforting familiarity and unsettling _déjà vu._ She kept thinking of that _Always Sunny_ screencap-turned-meme: _Been there? Not physically._ A hilarious, absurdist bit, and it was her whole goddamn life now, apparently.

A bundle of tiny bells chimed as Mar and Lisa entered the establishment. The large room was lit by candles on the walls and a few small chandeliers. A table near the entrance held some rune-like stones, an open book, a plant, and a burning incense stick. The smell of nag champa filled the air. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases lined the entryway as they made their way to the front counter. Up front, there were racks of robes and smaller glass cases filled with all sorts of magical items.

It was probably the most well-stocked magic supply store around. No wonder Solas picked this spot.

“Welcome to the Wonders of Thedas,” the elven man at the counter greeted. “Is there anything you’d like to see?”

A pale orange sunburst symbol was emblazoned on his forehead, standing out against his brown skin. His eyes looked tired, but his behavior was placid. Overly so.

Mar didn’t know how to react to meeting her first Tranquil. She couldn’t stop the pang of sympathy, threatening to come out as some foolish words of comfort that wouldn’t work anyways. They’d come across as patronizing, she was sure.

Lisa was unfazed by the monotone of his voice. “Hello! Actually, we’re looking for someone. Are you the proprietor?”

The man nodded. “I am. Julian Kallas, at your service.”

“Lisa,” she said, extending her hand. He grabbed in greeting it politely.

Mar followed suit, introducing herself and smiling. With Lisa acting normally, like nothing was wrong with this picture, it was easier to treat the man like the person he was instead of some poor lifeless subhuman. Subelf. Whatever.

“Who is it that you’re looking for?” he asked.

Mar cleared her throat. “A friend of mine. We just arrived from Ostagar. Keeper Lanaya said an elf that might’ve been him came into your shop and spoke with one of your employees. Tall, bald, might’ve been wearing a wolf-jaw necklace.”

Julian’s expression remained unchanged. “Ah, I recall that customer. That was my daughter who helped him. Allow me to fetch her.”

He climbed the stairs to the loft floor behind him and disappeared behind a door. They must’ve had a living quarters back there. Within a minute, he returned with a young elven woman in tow.

“Hello!” she greeted, extending her hand to both Lisa and then Mar. Her hair was shorn on the sides, the rest worn in thin locs twisted around into a short ponytail. “My name’s Ghilya. Pa says you’re the one asking about that elf stranger?”

The two of them accepted the warm greeting, introducing themselves. “He’s my former employer,” Mar explained. “We went on an expedition recently and got separated. I was hoping to get back in contact with him.”

She motioned for them to follow her, climbing back up the stairs. On the loft floor, there were a couple couches in front of a fireplace, and they each took seats. “He didn’t mention any expedition.” Ghilya looked into the fireplace, its light shining softly on her deep complexion. “He had some questions about items that could amplify one’s magical abilities. I showed him what we had, but nothing seemed to satisfy him.”

“Amplification?”

Ghilya shrugged, leaning back against the cushion. “I assumed he was another apostate that snuck into the city, looking for protection during the war.”

“Wait,” Lisa said, looking sharply at Mar. “You didn’t mention he was a mage.”

Mar blinked at her, pulling her head back in offense. “I thought you knew, Templar.”

Ghilya sat up from her easy reclining position, a scowl appearing on her round face. “You didn’t mention she was a Templar.”

“I’m not,” Lisa said, squeezing her eyes shut, thin veins dark webs on her lids. “Look. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to snap at you. Before my first lyrium draught, I’m not able to feel out a mage. The Keeper could probably tell, but she didn’t let me know.” Then, she looked at Ghilya, apologetic. “I have no quarrel with magic. I wish no harm to mages, never have.”

The girl had eyes like a feline, unmoving from her analytical stare. Then, she sighed, relaxing again. “Your order has done quite enough, and that’s all I’ll say on the subject.”

Nobody made a move to glance at the counter downstairs.

“Do you have any idea where he is?” Mar asked Ghilya, moving on.

Another piercing glance, her irises two black half-moons, this time aimed at Mar. Then, she looked back down at her lap. “I did offer to have something ordered for him if he was looking for anything specific. We would do our best to find a supplier. He said he would be moving on that evening.”

Mar’s shoulders fell, her lips pressing together. She was admittedly relieved, although she wasn’t prepared for just how strong the disappointment was.

“Well,” Lisa said, “we’ll be in the city for a while. Would you please let us know if you see any sign of him?”

Ghilya nodded.

“Thank you.”

As badly as Mar wanted to browse the shop — maybe get lost in some Elvhen history books somewhere — she knew she’d want to end up buying something with the meager few coins she had. She and Lisa bid the father and daughter team farewell, exiting the same way they came.

“What do you think he needed to amplify his magic for?” Lisa asked, walking down the road.

There was a lot running through Mar’s head. It took her a few seconds to respond. “I’m not sure. He’s a Fade mage. There’s not much you can do with Fade magic that requires that kind of power, aside from yanking the whole Veil down.”

…JEEsus _Christ. No wonder Solas foreshadows shit in conversations. This should_ not _be so fun._

“You think he’d do something like that?”

“Hah!” She snorted. “That guy? I doubt it. He’s more likely to have _created_ the thing in the first place, he never shuts up about it.”

_THIS IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE SO FUN._

_FUCK._

* * *

For the most part, Mar was good about not blatantly foreshadowing the apocalypse just for kicks. There was probably a reason Solas only pulled that on an Inquisitor who never listened to him — if you could, on purpose, reveal that you knew about some impending doom to the _biggest_ asshole you knew, and they laughed in your face?

Definitely worth it. But only if you were the one doing the whole apocalypse-bringing.

Lisa and Mar spent the rest of that day essentially asking around for tavern work. If she were in Orlais, or Antiva, she could totally find a nice little café to barista in. She _did_ love barista work. They were much harder to come by in Ferelden, the streets with tame dogs _actually_ roaming around.

They tried the Gnawed Noble, but Mar could already tell the progressive culture shift was more slow-going among the upper class. Most of the waitresses she could see were humans. They took one look at Mar’s shaved head and pointed ears and she saw the pin in their head land directly on “scullery maid.” But that wasn’t a full-time job and didn’t guarantee payment in room-and-board, so they moved on.

Mar constantly felt overwhelmed whenever they walked into a new spot. She didn’t have makeup on, she didn’t have a folder with copies of her resumé. She hadn’t even gotten to wash her face since arriving, for Void’s sake. The job hunt turned into grabbing some dinner after the fifth place, and then turned into bar hopping, essentially. Denerim was _huge,_ and she was grateful to have a tour guide.

“Hey,” she said to Lisa. “Did you mean what you said before? About not wanting to harm mages?”

The day had arrived at happy hour, when the workers of Denerim got off their shifts and gathered for a pint or two before heading home. Mar and Lisa sat at the bar, sipping tankards and chatting idly about their likes and dislikes.

Lisa finished her tankard and wiped her mouth, pushing it forward to let the barkeep know she was ready to place another order. Business had her scurrying back and forth, handling the rush with fluid efficiency. “I did. I… have never actually killed a mage before.” She smiled, if a bit forlornly. “I almost did, at that last skirmish, but I hesitated.” At this, she tapped her right leg. “Almost cost me a leg. Lucky the Dalish were watching the whole time.”

Mar propped her chin up with the flat of her palm, staring. “So, why in the Void do you want to be a Templar?”

The barkeep came over, grabbing the empty glass and mouthing, “Another?” to which she nodded and smiled. The chatter mixed with the music from the small stage, a duo playing a pan flute and a hammered dulcimer. It really was like your GM playing immersive music while your session takes place in a tavern; it was a familiar, soothing ambience that greatly diminished any hint of anxiety in Mar’s chest.

“Because I think they can do a better job at protecting people than the Chevaliers,” Lisa said, “if given the right reform. I was fortunate enough to be born the youngest, so my parents didn’t really mind when I asked to attend Chevalier school instead of marry.” Her grin brightened as she brought the fresh pint to her lips. “I figured they wouldn’t, seeing as they didn’t mind when I told them I was a girl and asked to be treated as such.”

“They seem like good folk,” Mar replied, returning the smile.

“Like I said, I was fortunate.”

Mar’s transdar had clocked her immediately, but not because her angular features read as inherently masculine. It was more like noticing an allied ship at sea. Mar never really talked about her gender outside of specific circles, but it also was never a pressing need in her life. She was _kind of_ a girl if you squinted, so the pronouns and presentation she was used to never really gave her dysphoria. It was nice to be recognized as a nonbinary woman sometimes, but seeing a happy trans person, alive and well, did her heart the most good. She felt safer around Lisa than anyone else she’d met here so far.

“I’m guessing you’re not a big Chevalier fan,” Mar said. Was her glass really almost empty? She looked for the barkeep — Jules, she’d heard a customer call her — but she was talking angrily with a human who’d just walked in, apparently an hour late — _“Where have you been?! This is the last time!”_ His attitude was unpleasant as he tied on his apron and got behind the counter for his shift.

Lisa laughed out loud. “Not when you’ve seen what kind of shit they get up to, and I’m not just talking about the hazing.”

Unsurprisingly, the Chevaliers were just all absolute shitheads. All of em. That particular calling didn’t stick with Lisa, but she knew she wanted to put her swordsmanship to use somewhere. It was basically either Templars or mercenary work from that point on, and the Order seemed to want peace, but suffered from corruption of those in power.

“I think the best way to change things,” she said, “is starting from the inside and work your way out. I think they’re all just scared, and I think we might have a chance to fix this.”

Her freckled-strewn cheeks glowed a warm peachy tone. Mar decided that she liked being friends with Lisa.

The tavern had filled out drastically in a short amount of time. She wasn’t drunk by any means, especially after the thick stew over wild rice they’d had for dinner. Lisa got her first payment upfront to celebrate arriving in one piece. Jules was just getting Mar a fresh tankard when a commotion at the other end caught most of the room’s attention. The guy who’d shown up late for his shift was arguing with a customer about the ratio of foam-to-ale in his tankard (which was indeed abysmally foamy). Jules just watched it all go down with bored dark eyes, hand on her hip, as the dudes started shouting back and forth. It didn’t seem to concern her, like she was watching little boys throw tantrums and waiting for them to be done.

Soon, they got swept outside by people who actually wanted to just sit down and have a beer. Mar watched Jules as she rubbed at her brow, taking a very slow, deliberate breath. Then, she raised her head with a smile and placed Mar’s tankard in front of her with a, “Here you go, hun.”

“Hey, uh,” Mar said, holding a finger forward to stop the woman from turning around. “Do you need help back there?”

“You got experience?”

Mar nodded. “Eight years, in Gwaren.”

“Want part of your paycheck paid in room-and-board?”

“Sure.”

“Cool, get yer ass over here and put on an apron. ”

Lisa and Mar looked at each other, equal parts surprised and pleased.

“What’s yer name?” she asked once Mar was behind the counter with washed hands. They had _soap_ here! Wild! Not really, but she sure was glad for it.

“Mar,” she replied over the fluctuating volume level. “What’s the name of this place again?”

“Julia’s Tavern. Welcome, Mar, go grab a keg of dark from the back, please.” She pointed at what looked very much like a small dolly to wheel it.

Mar grabbed it, suddenly feeling more normal than she had in weeks. “Yes, ma’am!”

Lisa and her exchanged grins and thumbs-ups, and she got to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! i promise i'm still writing this, taking breaks helps i think


	6. Not Now, But Soon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar buys a new baby and has Anxiety (shocker).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [throws y'all 3400ish words bc i WANT to update weekly for a while, so that's writing a chapter a week! so far so good]
> 
> i’m aiming for one of those re-readable types of longfics. saddle up, cowpoke.  
> today’s writing tip is: don’t forget to progress the goddamn story. slowly but surely.

Mar caught sight of her face in the bar mirror behind the two liquor shelves. She leaned in, fixing the smudge of eyeliner on the outer corners of her lower lids. It wasn’t too hard to find powdered charcoal, and distilling water was easy. She was glad for the investment; she knew her smile was five-stars, but a little something-something to bring out the eyes definitely didn’t hurt her tips every worknight.

Not that tips were an expected thing like they were in America. They were truly just an extra compliment for a pleasant tavern experience. Her income didn’t depend on them like they used to.

“A parrot! _”_ Ghilya continued. “They sent us a _bird_ instead of hale runes, and believe me, we did _not_ order that demon from _anyone.”_

Mar looked at her in the background, dumbfounded. “A… parrot. Like, a live one?”

“Yes! It was so _loud!”_

Her eyes went back to her reflection. In the direct light of the candles on the wall, the glinting marks over her upper face and head caught her attention. Mar studied them extensively anytime she got a second alone with a mirror. Shiny waves curling across her cheekbones, swoops diving through her temples, a swirling helix descending from her scalp into a strangely manta ray-shape on her forehead, its tail descending to the tip of her nose. It was intricate. Hard to get used to, really, but somehow, she did.

She’d only been working at Julia’s Tavern for two weeks, but it felt like she’d been there forever. To her surprise, she’d picked the only bar that Ghilya, the Wonders of Thedas worker, frequented. She’d come in a few days after Mar’s first, which, definitely, was the most chaotic one she’d had since her last Friday night on Earth. Woof.

The time had flown by as she got used to the little differences. Kegs worked pretty much the same, and those were most of what she handled for five-or-six hours. She didn’t feel singled out, since she wasn’t the only elf on payroll. If an asshole started giving her shit, the other _customers_ would come to her defense and tell ‘em cut it out or fuck off. Mar, for her part, was a _master_ at customer service, always ready to smile and ask what they need after that. Unfortunately on Earth, it seemed like her skills to keep her cool and move things along were _viciously_ undervalued. There wasn’t a Karen nor a Chad that could get under her skin. Here, in Thedas, she was treated more like a person and less like a vendor NPC.

Yeah.

Ghilya’s was a familiar face, and Mar had taken to her immediately. Slowly, they learned more about each other and grew to be friends. They started spending time outside of work with some of Ghilya’s other pals pretty quickly.

Some nights, her arm draped over the arm of an heirloom sofa, sipping the dandelion wine being passed around some elf’s living room, she could almost forget how not-at-home she felt.

She made sure not to drink per her normal habits. She couldn’t risk blacking out. The consequences would be drastic here. A hangover would be the least of her problems.

Mar stared at her reflection a second longer before leaning down to grab the tankard she’d originally turned away from the bar for. “Well, what’d you do with it?”

“Would you believe me if I said we had it for lunch?”

Mar poured one of the dark lagers on tap, letting the froth spill over into the drain underneath, and gave Ghilya a skeptical deadpan.

“An Orlesian man bought it that day,” she said, raising her hands innocently. “Said his wife _bred_ the things. It felt immoral to assist in bringing more of those wretched creatures to the world, but what can you do?” Mar slid the cup to the man who ordered it, smiling at him and accepting the tip he left for her graciously. Ghilya was eyeing her, grinning, as she pocketed it. “Look at you,” she said, “rakin’ it in. You’re a real natural at this, aren’t you?”

Mar leaned on the bar in front of her, thankful for a break in the rush. “I try _very_ hard to make it look this easy. Maybe I should get a job selling runes instead and you can try manhandling the drunks at last call.”

“Pass,” she said, smirking and taking a swig of her ale.

Throughout their friendship, Mar was able to establish a little more of her own backstory. In this fiction, she grew up with her single mother, an Antivan elf who worked as a housekeeper in Amaranthine. She brought Mar along on her shifts, letting her roam the estates as long as she didn’t break anything. Mar, providing an explanation for her literacy, said she usually found the library and read whatever she could reach. As she got older, she started working right alongside her mom. She was seventeen when the Fifth Blight occurred ten years ago. Her mother escaped the Battle of Amaranthine and took her to Gwaren, where she resumed work and then, sadly, died of pneumonia two years later. That’s when Mar took up tavern jobs.

It was a simple story to keep up. Anyone who wanted to trace her back to an elven housekeeper in a large city would be spending a lot of time sorting through the thousands there really were. Anonymity in numbers.

Most of all, she prioritized believability, which worked on Ghilya. In exchange, Ghilya often spent her nights at the bar, talking with Mar about her own life. She was born in the Denerim alienage, left with a single mother as well after her father was discovered to be a mage. Ironically, the prison of Tranquility was what allowed him to leave the prison of Kinloch Hold. Proving his skill in enchantment earned him ownership of the Wonders of Thedas, and thus they were reunited again.

When Mar asked about her mother, “She’s gone,” is all Ghilya said. Mar didn’t pry further.

There were few patrons in Julia’s Tavern that evening. Her shift would be over in another couple hours, and then she’d be free for her three-day weekend.

“Oh,” Mar said. “Are we still on for that ceremony on Saturday?”

“You bet!” Her eyes lit up, lights sparkling bright in those deep dark irises. “I’ll be working ‘til seven, so I’ll meet you at the square afterwards.”

All Soul’s Day, although sharing its name and theme with the holiday on Earth, occurred on the first day of August instead of November. It was originally called Funalis back in the old Vint days, connected to… Dumat? Yeah, Dumat. God of Silence. It was a solemn, respectful day of remembrance of the dead. Since this was the Fifth Blight’s tenth anniversary, there was going to be a big memorial unveiling for the victims in front of the Royal Palace, and all were encouraged to attend.

Honestly, Mar really wanted to see Alistair in person. He was one of her absolute favorite characters, and she really just wanted to see how he was handling the kingship. If he was doing okay. This was a safe opportunity to do so, blended into a crowd of such size. She had to admit, she was kind of excited.

The rest of Mar’s shift passed by without fuss. After the last call, she counted down the drawer, locked the drop bag in Jules’ office, and went about sweeping and mopping the lobby. It was two in the morning by the time she locked the door and retreated to her own room.

The rooms that Jules provided for her staff were by no means luxurious, only having enough space for a twin-size bed and a desk. She’d seen _closets_ with more room in them, but it didn’t bother her. Although she was more than ready to flop onto her thin mattress and pass out, she sat herself down at the small writing desk. She struck a match, lit one of her candles and pulled out the notebook she’d picked up at Ostagar.

_Wednesday, Solace 29, 9:40 Dragon._

Ever since she clarified the year and day, she made sure to keep track. Backtracking, she learned that she’d woken up in those ruins on the last day of last month, Justinian 30. Having a sense of time grounded her.

When she wrote in her notebook, she used English script. She hadn’t spoken a word of it since Fionna had her in an armlock. If someone found it, it was more likely they’d think it was a cipher or code than a whole new otherworldly language. Mostly, she used it to keep track of the things she knew — random facts about Thedas, the characters she knew intimately while having yet to actually meet them, the histories that a commoner would have no way of knowing. The Blight, the Evanuris, the Titans, the Ancient Magisters. All of them, written in plain sight, in a notebook that she never took out in front of anyone.

Her only _true_ defense, after the hiding-its-existence bit, was that she wrote it all as poetry. Flowery descriptions, metaphors, idioms, and even words specific to the American English language that would translate poorly into others, if done literally.

_Tea isn't the wolf's cup of tea. Caffeine keeps him up so he can't touch base with spirits. Wonder if he knows he's in sheepskin, wonder if he knows about my x-ray vision. Is his best offense something I can beat? Is it something I can help?_

She never said it was _good_ poetry. Yeah, she mostly wrote about Solas and what to do when she found him. She came up with ways to get close to him, and how to let him know she was a safe person to tell all his secrets to. How to convince him to try and get her back home.

The fact of the matter was, he was afraid. He was in a bonkers level of emotional pain, and he believed that he could confide in no one. She didn’t want him to know that she knew everything he was hiding — she wanted him to tell her of his own accord. If he didn’t trust her enough to tell her, then why would he trust her enough to let her live if he found out she knew anyways?

She didn’t want to use his secrets against him. She wanted to help him find another way to fix things.

Of course, she had no ideas at the moment. The only place she knew to start was having a conversation with him and seeing what he was really like. There had been no sign of him in Denerim; he probably _did_ left weeks ago, like he said he would. Ghilya still kept an eye out in case he came back, but so far, nothing. It was frustrating, but she didn’t know what else to do, besides wait for the Conclave and risk visiting Haven to meet him. If she could find him before then, that’d be ideal, but wandering the open road in the middle of a war was sure to end her far before that happened.

Sighing, she closed the red leather-bound notebook and shoved it back under her mattress. Snuffing the candle and shedding her clothes, she climbed into bed and pulled her cloak-turned-blanket over her.

As the claws of sleep courted her consciousness, she wondered if she might dream tonight. It occurred to her that she hadn’t dreamt once since arriving. That was probably significant somehow, but just like everything else, she’d deal with that later.

* * *

The dawn of All Soul’s Day brought with it another paycheck for Mar, a pouch of coins slipped through the mail slot on her room’s door. She didn’t have anyone in this world who would send her a letter, besides maybe Lanaya, who’d been updated on the situation. The rest of the world had no idea she existed.

Mar slid out of bed, pulling on her breeches and tunic. The undershirt was too thick for this kind of weather. It was comfortably warm, but the sun had only just come up, painting the sky pale pinks and oranges. Her closet-room had a small window, the sound of finches chirping in the trees that dotted the city streets pouring through.

Going without shoes seemed like the elfy thing to do, but even the Denerim elves had some sort of footwear to protect them from the elements. Maybe that was just a thing in more temperate climates. She pulled her boots on, grabbed her halla leather satchel, and headed out the door, ready to have a good day.

It had been… a while since she’d felt like that. Even on Earth. Waking up was always the first chore of the day. So many things used to weigh on her mind — student loans, career options, family issues — but there were no personal issues she had to see a therapist for here. She didn’t even get a serotonin crash from being off her meds.

The market district was busier than ever. People from nearby villages had come for the ceremony that night. Vendors held holiday sales for all kinds of wares. She made her way around the stalls, making sure to keep her satchel close. Lisa had continued giving her self-defense lessons, and although she’d made progress, she’d rather not try to wrestle her bag away from an armed bandit.

The Royal Guard were out in full force today, no doubt watching for that very sort of activity. Some of them, she actually recognized as regulars at Julia’s. She smiled and waved when they saw her, striking up amicable conversations as she wandered with the crowd.

Finally, she found the stall she was looking for. An Antivan merchant named Eusebio, who specialized in musical instruments. She approached indirectly, feigning disinterest.

“Ah, young mistress!” he said, greeting her. “Your ears look _perfect_ for listening to fine music! Might I interest you in this lovely miniature harpsichord for your living room? It’s built of genuine rosewood!”

Mar pursed her lips, pretending to consider his offer. “I do love myself a nice string instrument, but a harpsichord is a bit unwieldy, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Oh, oh yes!” he recovered. “Yes, of course! You must be a lady on the go, no?” He turned around, picking up a small lyre. “Perhaps this might satisfy you, hm? A beautiful instrument, lightweight, brass-plated, you’ll find none of better quality!”

She cast her gaze around his wares, eyes settling on what she’d really come here for, pointing. “What about that one?”

Eusebio looked at the dinky old banjo she’d picked. “That old thing? Oh, no, miss, surely you’d prefer an instrument of higher quality than that?”

“How much?” she said, smiling brightly at him.

They bartered for a few minutes, finally settling on a couple silver and small handful of coppers. Stashing the spare set of strings in the lightweight case it came with, she bid Eusebio a blessed All Soul’s Day and left with her prize.

She spent the rest of the morning in a small park, tuning her new baby, trying to think of what to dub her. Mar had named all of the instruments she owned back in Portland — an acoustic guitar named Alfons, a slide guitar named Mona, a pink ukelele named Rose. A banjo was too expensive back home, but here it was considered a layman’s instrument. That suited her just fine. She wasn’t going for fancy, just affordable and playable. While she’d never owned one, she’d futzed around on the ones her friends had whenever she hung out with them.

She plucked at the strings, staying in minor keys. She still thought about Portland and how much she missed it. And her friends. Had time kept moving on Earth? Was anyone looking for her? Had she even disappeared, or was a doppelgänger waltzing around, piloted by some other entity? If she knew how she got here, it might be easier to answer questions like that. There were a few _plausibilities,_ but it was impossible to confirm any of them with zero recollection of the events.

This whole existential thing was getting normal, though. She wasn’t freaked out by questions without answers anymore. She was sure she’d figure it out, one way or another. In the meantime, she enjoyed the sunshine, the insects buzzing in the foliage, the clean air smelling of cinnamon and clove. _That’s right, get back in the bottle. There you go, nice and suppressed. I’ll deal with you. Not now, but soon._

Slowly, she strummed chords she knew, wondering if she could get away with playing songs from Earth. Of course she could. Who here would call her out on plagiarism? She didn’t actually have to claim ownership, just say she heard them somewhere on her travels. Mar thought long and hard about appropriate songs. Nothing that mentioned anything Earth-centric, or else she’d just change the lyrics a little. That wouldn’t be a problem.

How about some All Soul’s Day songs? She knew plenty of songs about death painted in a somber tone. She’d even written songs in that vein.

People milled about, paying no mind to the elf sitting under the willow tree. She was confident enough in her abilities to just play for herself, no pressure from an audience or open mic manager.

She played some of her favorites, realizing as she played them just how much she missed listening to music. She loved it. It got her through all the hard times in her life. She loved singing, playing, writing. Maybe it was that stab of yearning that sparked the passion with which she strummed her banjo, keeping time, feeling out the beat. By the time she finished _Up The Wolves_ by The Mountain Goats, a few people were clapping and encouraging her. They were by no means gathered in a crowd, but assembled in their own organic way throughout the greenery.

She played a little more, mostly just instrumentals, humbled by their attention. Turns out, some My Chemical Romance songs translated very well into Thedas-era quasi-medieval music tastes. _The Ghost of You_ was a big hit to those grieving loved ones lost in the Blight. Another heart-wrencher was _12/17/12_ by her fave, The Decemberists. Some people came up to her, thanking her for this sort of catharsis, throwing _very_ generous tips into her open case. She tried to refuse their money, but they insisted, so instead she thanked them and played more songs.

This wasn’t exactly what she’d hoped to do when she started practicing in public, but she never discounted the possibility. Her last partner, Angie, was a street musician, and just hearing her stories inspired her to do the same, busking whenever she could outside of her bartending shifts.

Truthfully, this was the most _real_ she’d felt since landing her ass in that old ruin. If this was the reason she was brought here, she understood. Music was important. She knew that better than anyone.

* * *

She took a few breaks, grabbing a bite to eat and searching for new spots to busk. By the time the sun started falling in the sky, she’d made back the money she’d spent on her banjo threefold. Mar still had no idea what to name her. She thought about different names on her way to meet up with Lisa before heading to the square.

Mar had started getting comfortable zoning out on her walks again. It was an old comfort thing, she knew, to go for walks to clear her head from whatever was stressing her. It’s why she had a habit of not paying attention to her surroundings when she really should. She approached the Chantry, ducking past a pair of Templar guards. It wasn’t until they were well behind her that she stopped in her tracks, a delayed sense of whiplash snapping her back to reality. She turned to look back at them, watching their casual patrol. She stood still, watching, unsure, thoughts spinning again.

Was it a trick of the light? Was she seeing things? She’d only glimpsed their faces, but she could’ve sworn…

No, she was imagining it. They weren’t… It wasn’t…

Tried as she might, she couldn’t remember whether red lyrium had been introduced _this_ early in Denerim or not. The games didn’t touch on this.

How much did she… _actually_ know?

She crossed her arms as she approached the Chantry, hiding the tremble in her hands. Her breathing relaxed as she saw more Templars, whose faces showed no sign of what she _thought_ she saw.

“What’s up?” Lisa said upon seeing her. She was in her recruit armor, a less bulky version of the traditional Templar platemail. “Are you okay?”

Did she look shaken? Shit. “Yeah, no, I’m… hey, uh, this might sound weird,” she said, “but have you seen any… you know what, never mind. Wanna see my new baby?”

The banjo was a good distraction from the red glow in those Templars’ eyes that she was pretty sure her paranoid ass was just imagining anyways.

Lisa shrugged, let it go, and helped her think of names. But nothing stuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you guys know this IS going to end up diving into the Blight, Evanuris, Titans, and Magisters, of COURSE it is, couldn’t you tell from how QUICKLY i’m getting there??  
> also, just a quick meta note about her Lore Knowledge Library: i’m having her up to date on the games, comics, and books as of like. today, as i post this, on may 14, 2020. so anything that comes out from now on - including DA4 - if it doesn’t work in this or renders some proposed theories wrong……...idk ignore it lol. this story is about TAKING CANON and PUSHING IT SOMEWHERE ELSE to make room for my cool and awesome Hot Takes.
> 
> plus i feel that the events of DA4 will be HIGHLY dependent on what happened in DA;I, and I aim to, uh, change some Things That Happen. Don't Worry, I Know What I'm Doing, I Promise.
> 
> thank u for reading, like n comment if it made you feel Anything At All! definitely comment if Typing Like This Actually Annoys You bc i don't know how to uhhhhh communicate thnx


	7. The Ring of Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mistakes are made and impossible things occur.

The silliest mistakes you make in the world are often made because you thought things through too much or not at all.

In Mar’s case, it was usually too much. But this time, it was not at all.

She didn’t think it would be an issue to stop by the Wonders before the ceremony, even though they were supposed to meet Ghilya at the square. Lisa had revealed a bottle of wildwine she’d saved specifically for her induction the next day. That is, until she learned the elven girl had never _tasted_ wildwine. She wanted to include her, suggesting picking her up since she lived along the way, maybe pre-game a little. It was her idea, borne from knowing how much Mar liked Ghilya, but Mar was certain that there was no way she could’ve known.

For that matter, neither did Mar. Her mind was fairly preoccupied by the image of glowy red veins just underneath the skin. When the front door opened, unlocked, Mar assumed Ghilya was grabbing inventory in the back. It was a few minutes past close, so they locked it for her. They called out her name, then Julian’s, but no one responded.

She wasn’t thinking at _all_ as she climbed the stairs to their living quarters, telling Lisa she’d be right back. As she was about to call out again, she passed by Ghilya’s bedroom door, cracked open. A beam of light flickered on the edges of her vision. She stopped, air trapped in her throat, and gently opened the door.

If she had stopped and just _thought_ for a second, she wouldn’t have encountered what she was definitely not supposed to.

Before she had a chance to scrape her mind together, she realized that Lisa had followed her. They stood beside each other, watching a brilliant white light spill out from Ghilya’s palms pressed to her father’s forehead. Their eyes were both closed, deep in concentration.

Lisa had followed her. Templar Recruit Lisa was discovering a mage. After whatever words she had also died on her tongue, she observed for a solid five seconds. Then, as inconspicuous as they’d arrived, she turned tail and walked away.

 _…Oh._ Mar followed, thinking to herself, with emphasis, _Oh, fuck_ _me._

Once they were both outside, Lisa marching right towards the Chantry, Mar found it in her to grab her by the arm, jerking her to a halt. “We’re going to miss the ceremony.”

Lisa’s blue eyes, pupils blown in the dimming dusk light, burned at her. Mar held her stare right back, close enough to hear her uneasy breathing over the common chatter around them. She could hear the fear in it, feel it in her taut bicep. Then, she lifted her arm before shortly yanking it out of Mar’s grasp. To her relief, though, she acquiesced and made for the square.

“You said you’ve never killed a mage,” Mar hissed lowly, keeping close pace. “But how many have you reported to the Chantry?”

Lisa kept her stare forward, squaring her jaw. “Those are two different actions, Mar.”

She jumped ahead, placing herself right in Lisa’s lane, making her stop again and look her in the eyes. “Are they?”

A swallow, and then she moved around her. No reply.

They moved on in silence before Mar spoke again. “Just… just give her until after your induction tomorrow.”

“And give the demons a chance to swallow her first?” Her tone was grave. “I have to carry out my duty.”

“Yeah, well, that duty is _shite.”_ Mar looked at her. “For me, Lisa. Please?”

They were standing on the edge of the square at this point. Lisa stopped and turned to her, searching her face for what, she didn’t know. “…Will you still be at the induction?”

The two held gazes for a long moment. Mar sighed, licking her lips. “Turning her in will make you a good Templar, but it won’t make you a good friend. I won’t watch you put someone in danger for the sake of _duty.”_

Lisa blinked rapidly, nodding her head and looking down at the ground. Mar recognized how she swiped her tongue across her teeth behind her closed lips, biting on it to prevent emotion from showing on her face. She gave her one last glance before murmuring, “Right, then,” and leaving to find her place in the Templar Guard for the ceremony.

Mar was left alone under a torch-lit lamppost, shutting her eyes and breathing in deeply. Then, she breathed out, slowly. She really wanted Lisa to defy her expectations. She thought her friendship would’ve been enough, but there really was no changing someone who didn’t want to change.

She knew that as well as anyone else. It was stupid of her to believe this time might’ve been different.

The weight in her chest constricted her as she moved lethargically through the gathering crowd. No color remained in the starry night sky, a testament to how little light pollution there was. She’d have to find a book of constellations, seeing as she recognized none of them here. However small it was, the fact left her with a hole in her heart darker than the Void.

This wasn’t the sort of social issue she knew how to deal with. Her only two friends had _tried_ being friends together, but unfortunately one was sworn to put the other in a cage and/or lobotomize her for, _checks Ghilya’s list of offenses,_ uh, existing.

It was easier when it was just Angie not being able to communicate with Mar’s roommate, Kacie, about sensitive topics, because Kacie was passionate and loud and Angie was pacifist and open-hearted. They were still _friends,_ though. Why couldn’t Lisa just let it slide?

She almost had to laugh. Lisa was an Orlesian Templar and Ghilya was an apostate. She couldn’t blame Lisa anymore than she could blame a cat for hunting a mouse. It was in the cat’s nature.

But Lisa wasn’t a cat. She was a human. And if it was in every human Templar’s nature to hunt elven apostates, then what hope was there for the two groups to coexist peacefully?

“‘Scuse me,” she heard. “Pardon me, my friend is up there, thank you. Hey, Mar! You got a good spot!”

Mar turned, watching a bright-eyed Ghilya slip through the crowd to stand beside her. She didn’t even notice how close to the raised platform she’d gotten, clouded by her now _doubly_ preoccupied headspace. Mar smiled, reflecting her blissful ignorance, promising to address this problem _after._ She could at least let Ghilya enjoy this night before telling her what they saw.

You’d never guess her to be a mage. Now that Mar knew, it made a lot of sense. Ghilya slid her arm around Mar’s, grinning up at her. She was only a few inches shorter, but it was endearing. “Are you excited? I nabbed a bottle of cherry wine from the market, if you and Lisa would kindly help me finish it later at my place?”

“I’m certainly in,” she said. “I’ll show you what I got from the market, too!” She lifted her banjo case, still in her hand. “You won’t believe how much money I made busking today.”

Mar shifted her conflicts to the backburner, talking with Ghilya about their days as the crowd gradually filled out. She glanced around, mildly surprised at how dense it’d gotten by the time the drums started.

The chatter died and attention went toward the front, where the platform had been built around the memorial. It was covered by cloth, its stone base the only indication that a statue was underneath. She wondered if the artist had designed something creative, like Maya Lin’s Vietnam Memorial in D.C. There were supposed to be the names of all those in Denerim who lost their lives in defense etched into the piece, but that’s all anyone knew about it. It was tall, though — about twenty feet high. No wonder it took years to make.

Between the crowd and the stage sat a small sort of orchestra pit, boxed in by two ramps on either side leading up to the platform. As the drums grew louder, maintaining a slow, rumbling beat, they were joined by the brass section, low and solid. The ramps continued into roped-off aisles, splitting the audience into three sections. Mar and Ghilya stood a few rows behind the front edge of the center crowd, turning with everyone to watch the procession begin.

It started with a few men carrying banners adorned with the sigils of Denerim, Ferelden, the Templars, and the Chantry. Then came a few Templars, then the Royal Guard officers in their shiniest decorative armor. At the very end, by the time the woodwinds joined in to add a hopeful harmony to the anthem, came two gilded, one-man palanquins on each side, perfectly parallel, flanked by properly armed Royal Guards.

Whispers of excitement rippled through the crowd, rising and dying softly. Ghilya squeezed Mar’s arm, the two of them locked by the elbow. She bounced up and down on her toes, tapping rapidly on Mar’s wrist. “That’s them!” she whispered giddily. “The King and Queen!”

It was impossible not to succumb to the same animated energy as her friend. Mar pressed her tongue between her teeth, the corners of her lips refusing to do anything but form a grin. The last note of the anthem held for a couple extra measures as the two vehicles were set down, the doormen opening the gold-and-white framed doors.

At once, King Alistair and Queen Anora stepped out of their respective palanquins, waving to the applauding crowd before meeting each other in the middle of the platform. Behind them, the hidden statue loomed, lit on all sides by the fiery lamplight, deep shadows cast within the drapery folds. They joined hands, their matching midnight-blue gown-and-robe combo only further pronouncing their complimentary union.

That specific shade of blue must have been a nod to Alistair’s Warden ties. She knew he was only thirty years old, but the way the shadows hit his face defined a few more lines, painting him slightly older than that. Still, though, he was smiling at Anora as they joined hands, glove in glove, without a shred of awkwardness.

The queen’s pallor failed to hide her blushing as well as Alistair’s medium tones did his. The volume fell as they took that moment for themselves, shared a conversation with a look, and then turned towards their people and began to speak.

Mar’s heart, suddenly, was filled to the brim, threatening to spill over as actual tears. She swallowed and blinked, watching a person she cared for so deeply despite never meeting beat her expectations by a _landslide._ She had been afraid to see him fake a smile, afraid to catch a frown in those moments when nobody was looking, afraid to see the weight of his fate crushing him, invisibly but nonetheless clearly.

She instead caught him stealing looks at his Queen, and her returning them in sincerity. They were undoubtedly the strongest pair of monarchs seen since Maric and Rowan.

She wanted to write a song about them, she decided.

King Alistair’s dry humor was every bit as present as she remembered it in Origins. The crowd responded enthusiastically, as if everyone had accustomed to an untraditionally lax relationship with their king. Was it because he had known a great deal of people before having his royal bloodline revealed publically? Or was it that he simply knew how to diffuse and compromise as fairly as possible? Queen Anora’s input, she’d heard, was crucial to every decision the pair made together.

“Well,” he said, “enough about goats. Without further ado, oh patient public, let us commence our All Soul’s day ceremony!”

For a second, she let herself enjoy this one moment, separate from the issues braised in her head. Ghilya’s arm was warm in the crook of her own. At least, right now, she had a friend. She might not after this.

But that was later, and this was now. She squeezed Ghilya’s arm back, returning the warm smile she gave in response.

The orchestra resumed playing, something soft, while a Chantry sister onstage sang a Chant of Light hymn. A small team of finely-dressed servants, both human and elven, traveled the length of the two aisles, one on each side. They carried small baskets loaded with small bundles. They passed them out to the crowd, unwrapping the bundles to reveal stout white candles, which they ferried inward, everybody taking one. After every aisle had been reached and then double-checked on the way back, two Circle mages at the rear followed them up, dispensing a small flame from their fingertips to light the candles on the edges. People shared their candle’s flame with their neighbor, and in a few minutes, everyone had a small, flickering candle in their hands.

None of the Templars or Guards held candles, but each of the servants, footmen, and monarchs did. The two mages reached the platform, moving to stand on either side of Alistair and Anora. As they raised their hands, they mirrored them, holding their candles up high. The crowd copied them, and so Mar did too.

The hymn, one that talked about Andraste being captured and burned at the stake, ended on a high note. Then, Queen Anora’s clear voice, projected impressively, rang out. “As we honor the sacrificial death of Our Holy Prophet Andraste,” she called, wearing confidence like a natural, “so we, too, honor the ones of those lost during the Fifth Blight ten years ago.”

Vivid blue light appeared on the mage’s fingertips, gaining brightness with every word spoken. Alistair continued, “This memorial is dedicated to every soul lost, represented by a figure that, I believe I speak for all of us when I say, indeed qualifies to serve as the face of everyone’s sacrifice.”

Not a second later, the mages’ blue light sparked, bursting from the palm outwards into a blue flame. As their spell grew brighter, the flames of Alistair and Anora’s candles were overtaken by the same hue, blue flames devouring the natural warm light. Like a chain reaction had been triggered, in a wave emanating from the stage, the flames in the crowd transformed from warm to the exact same blue, held high in their hands.

The whole thing was enchanting, turning even the lamplights’ flames around the square blue. State-sanctioned magic was allowed to honor ceremonies, Mar supposed. She wasn’t expecting it to be anything but decorative, surface-deep pyrotechnics.

Then, the two mages beside them closed their eyes. When they reopened them, they were glowing blue, and Mar was jarringly reminded of Justice.

She leaned down toward Ghilya’s ear. “What are they doing?”

“All Soul’s Day,” she replied, “is a day when spirits are _venerated,_ not feared. It dates back to old Avvar tradition. They’re asking them to pick a volunteer from the commoner population.”

Mar looked at her, unsure of why a fresh pang of anxiety speared her through the gut. Her experience with spirits in Thedas was nonexistent. Why would one pick her?

Before she could ask anything else, a flash pulled her attention forward. The bottom of the sheet covering the monument caught on fire, the intense blue flame racing up the fabric. A wind kicked up, and Mar closed her eyes by reflex against the dust.

She heard the flame roar to a monsterous size, and when she opened her eyes, the last if it swallowed itself, settling as ash on the shoulders of the statue. There stood a dark stone sculpture of an elven woman, gold foil _vallaslin_ — _Ghilan’nain’s_ _design,_ her brain automatically supplied — covering her face, facing the crowd with a longbow aimed at a slight upward angle. The platform was built high enough to land the arrow tip at Alistair’s shoulder height.

Mar was the last one to notice that her candle, raised high above her head, was still lit blue.

Everyone else’s candle had gone out. The lamplights were glowing yellow-orange again.

Mar stared at her blue candle. Registered the resounding silence. She turned immediately to Ghilya, whose eyes were _right_ on her, mouth open. Then, she smiled.

“It’s you,” she breathed. “You get to complete the ceremony!”

“...What does that mean?”

“Our volunteer has been chosen!” Queen Anora announced, looking towards another section of the crowd. “Let us welcome them to the platform!”

_Oh. Fuck. Me._

Another applause began. Ghilya let go of Mar’s arm, although Mar badly wished she hadn’t. People in front her made space to pass through. The shove Ghilya gave her was incredibly gentle, a suggestion of movement more than anything.

She moved forward by the cruelty of some other entity, because there was no way she was voluntarily getting closer. Her eyes flicked back and forth from the King’s, the Queen’s, and the statue’s. Alistair and Anora’s facial expressions shifted the longer they looked at her. She couldn’t avoid realizing why, as she climbed the ramp and stopped mere _feet_ away from the statue and King Alistair, her candle clutched in visibly trembling hands. Slow breath, slow breath.

Alistair. The look on his face… And then, as she turned to the crowd, the look on _all_ of their faces.

Silence. _Dead_ silence.

“Please state your name,” Alistair said, ten times quieter.

She couldn’t look at him. “Mar.”

“Full name, please, dear.”

Mar did turn to look at Anora, who remained stone-faced.

“Marlaina Andrade.”

Queen Anora faced the crowd, a expertly-forced smile appearing on her face. “Thank you for your participation, Marlaina. Will you please step closer to the statue and light the torch?”

It was impossible to ignore. It was impossible to mistake. It was impossible to even be a thing, really, but as Mar passed in front of a now-stoic Alistair and took her place beside the monument, the familiar feeling cropped up. _This might as well just happen._

Her throat was too dry to speak again. Fueled again by some unnameable force, she lit the tip of the arrow, which doubled as a torch. It caught quickly, blooming to a healthy size, illuminating her own face along with the _specifically_ _accurately depicted_ face of Lyna Mahariel.

Who looked _just_ like Mar.

_Hey, I just had an interesting thought._

_Actually fuck this._

* * *

Mar would struggle, later, to recall how exactly she managed to get out of there. She’d been led back to the crowd by one of the servants, just before the music restarted to close the whole thing out. Her cloak was still at home, but she sure would’ve appreciated a hood to hide behind. Once the last of the guards processed down the aisles, the crowd dispersed.

Ghilya found her and tugged on her hand to follow. They serpented through the crowd, her setting the pace at a hearty power-walk. Mar didn’t have the courage to look anywhere but the ground. Soon, they were sitting on her bed, cradled inside a bay window overlooking an alleyway and the neighboring brick buildings.

“What,” Ghilya said, “was _that?”_ She never raised the volume, but her anger had _teeth._ Not snapping, but definitely showing. Mar continued sitting quietly. “Well? Mind enlightening me as to _why_ you look like you could be the _twin sister_ of the _Hero of Fucking Ferelden?!”_

“I don’t know. I am _just_ learning this now. But that’s not why I need to talk to you.”

Ghilya scoffed in disbelief. “Do _not_ change the subject, Mar. What else could be _so—”_

“Lisa knows you’re a mage,” Mar blurted, a little louder than intended. She clamped a hand over her mouth as Ghilya’s jaw snapped shut, her eyes wide.

“She knows I’m a… what?” she said, giving her a weirded out look. “Mar. If I were a mage, why would I live anywhere _near_ Denerim with all these Templars around?” Her eyes turned cold. “It didn’t exactly work out for my pa. Not as well as it should’ve.”

“Because you learned from his mistake,” Mar said before thinking. Thinking was for smarter people than her right now. “You’re succeeding. Or, you were. We stopped by before the ceremony and… saw you in here. With Julian.”

Now, Ghilya’s stare was _truly_ weirded out. Her shoulders sank as she sighed slowly. “Fuck.” She was silent for a moment, chewing on the inside of her cheek. Her voice was soft, venomless once more. “When is Lisa going to tell them?”

“I’m… not sure,” Mar confessed. “I asked her to wait until after her induction tomorrow, but she didn’t specifically agree to when I said I wouldn’t be attending if she would still be ousting you. So, the latest she’ll be here is afternoon tomorrow, buuuut the soonest is most likely a couple hours from now, so… what do you want to do?”

The elf went quiet. Her side-undercut allowed all of her locs to be pushed to one side of her head, falling to frame the left side of her round cheekbones from Mar’s angle. She looked at Mar from the corner of her eyes. “Will you help me pack?”

She smiled and nodded.

Ghilya grinned, opening a drawer under her bed and procuring a _jumbo_ sized bottle of a dark red cherry wine. “Let’s do this.”

“As long as we brush our teeth afterwards,” Mar said, accepting the mostly-clean cup filled with the room temperature, liquid velvet. It smelled as sweet as it did strong. “This stuff will give you _mad_ cavities.”

Ghilya sputtered laughing, cocking her head. “That’s certainly a way to phrase it.”

American slang sometimes translated poorly. In Common, it sounded like she was saying the cavities were clinically insane. She was still working on it, instead deciding to own her newfound title of _trendstarter._ The first time she heard Ghilya, while telling a rude customer off, use the phrase, _“go munch a bag of cocks,”_ in Common, it took all of Mar’s willpower not to lose her _entire_ shit.

It was dangerous. But it was also _hilarious._

Making Ghilya laugh was the least she could do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOOOO THE PLOT IS STARTING TO TWIST FINALLYYY
> 
> thank you v much for reading, i crave all of your attention like the poor street urchin i truly am


	8. Run from that Sun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the All Soul's Day ceremony, Mar and Ghilya retreated to the Wonders of Thedas. Their slumber party gets canceled and Mar flies like Icarus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shit i’m mentioned on the mcit tumblr that’s cool right? guys am i cool yet?? thank u for 101 kudos, [jamie lynn spears voice] OO~oooo~  
> i will continue to abuse both italics and caps lock bc i am fully capable of doing so. nobody complained, i’m just letting yall KNOW that I Am Aware. pce

Mar forced herself to drink slowly, both in order to savor the rich, robust sweetness in the mildly earthy wine, and also so that she wouldn’t get shit-faced.

In any other situation, she would’ve been able to do both, but she was halfway through her third cup when she bothered to _look_ at the handmade label. Ah, yes, her dizziness upon standing _was_ to blame on the _17% alcohol content._ Goddamn, it did _not_ taste like it.

Being drunk meant she might lose some control over what she said. She could forgive herself for minor cases of loose lips. If she said something she _really_ shouldn’t, her inebriation might be enough to cover her, whether for “Can’t Recall” or “Hammered Nonsense.” She’d just gotta ride that sweet spot between coherent and black-out. It was easier said than done when you took into account the _stress_ that Mar was under at the time. Her ability to limit her alcohol intake diminished — severely _and_ proportionally — the greater the stress she was using it to cope with was.

One of the unlatched windows drifted open, allowing a cool summer’s breeze into the room. Ghilya arranged a small pile of belongings methodically into her tough, canvas pack. Mar closed her eyes, breathed in slowly, and breathed out slowly.

Lanaya had recognized Lyna’s face in her the _moment_ they met. She’d pegged it as a trick pulled by demons. Some chick shows up, wearing a decade-long dead woman’s face, except the tattoos are _wrong_ and it’s _definitely_ not her? That’s _Beginner’s Guide to Demonspotting_ level shit, probably. And Mar didn’t even seem to realize who she looked like!

Because she didn’t! She _did_ mention to Gheyna that she’d never met The Hero before. At least that wasn’t a hole in the web she was weaving that needed filling.

She wondered if Solas would recognize her face as Mahariel’s, if he could see what she’d looked like from the Fade. Did anyone paint her portrait? Is it hanging in the Royal Palace or at Grey Warden HQ? Was she cremated or was she laid to rest somewhere with it, framed right over her sarcophagus in eternal memoriam?

 _Whoever sculpted that statue,_ she thought, _is the_ butchest _artist in the city, I can_ feel _it._ (Author’s Note: She was, indeed, the butchest artist in the city.)

Dimly, she imagined meeting the sculptor, face-to-face, becoming her muse. Make _super_ gay art. It’s all she ever wanted to do on Earth, really. Maybe she could own this, too. Become the first Lyna Mahariel impersonator, write songs based on the events of Origins, kiss lots of masculine women and effeminate men. Until the apocalypse happens in like five years or something.

Well. It was good to have a Plan Z.

A nudge on her shoulder. She snorted loudly and jolted out of her half-awake state. She didn’t realize how far her train of thought had run away, mimicking the non-logic process of dreaming, without actually having fallen asleep.

Ghilya spared one of her quilts. “It’s been a long day. I wanna get a few hours in, too. Early start, though.”

Mar hummed in agreement, curling up on the other side of the bed. There was a lot of cushioning around the bed, allowing them just enough space to be comfortable and remain unobtrusive.

 _“Thank you,”_ Ghilya said in Elvhen. “For telling me.”

She was already fading again, but managed to hum. “I’d want someone to do the same for me.”

In Portland, she was used to falling asleep to the sound of trains, late buses, and cars driving through the neighborhood. Here, there was only the occasional call of a loon and a faroff dog’s response.

* * *

Of the two, Ghilya was the lighter sleeper, evidenced by the fact that she was shaking Mar awake, whispering. It was still dark out.

“Good, you’re up,” Ghilya said. Mar mumbled something semi-coherent, even to herself. “Someone keeps throwing pebbles at my window.”

Mar rubbed her eyes, yawning, and then shook her head into focus. “Want me to see who it is?”

Ghilya nodded, just as another one _tinged_ off the latched bay window on Mar’s side. As her ears perked up, she could make out the sound of someone whisper-shouting.

“It’s Lisa,” Mar said, her brow knitting together.

Ghilya crossed her arms. “I’m not here.”

She leaned over the closed window and unlatched it, cranking it open and poking her head out. Sure enough, there she stood in her recruit armor, searching for another pebble to throw, alone.

 _“Lisa,”_ she whispered sharply from the two-story window. “What are you _doing_ here?”

She bolted up, relief in her smile. “Oh, _merci,_ you’re here.” It never failed to amuse Mar that Orlesian was _literally_ just French. She didn’t know where to _begin_ in wondering why that was. “I have to talk to you. Is Ghilya there?”

“No,” Mar lied immediately, “she left last night.”

Louder than she seemed to intend, Lisa swore, then covered her mouth.

Mar’s grip on the windowsill grounded her. “...You told them.”

 _“No,”_ Lisa responded. “I swear, I didn’t, but…”

She fought the urge to turn and look at Ghilya. “What happened?”

Looking up, Lisa’s shoulder slumped. “Mar,” she said, “we have to get her back.”

“No way. Why would I—”

“Fuck’s sake, they’re not after her!” Lisa snapped. “They’re after _you!”_

Nobody moved as the silence cut through again, marked only by another set of barking. Then, Mar swallowed and spoke calmly. “Like… it would’ve been cool if you’d started with that. You can just do that next time, okay?”

“Look,” she said. “We need to get you out of town because they know you from Julia’s. They’ll be there looking for you by dawn. Grab what you need and let’s _go.”_

Ghilya’s whisper was low enough to only be perceived by Mar’s elven ears. _“Smells like a trap to me.”_

“Why in the Void are they after _me?”_ Was it the whole Looks-Like-The-Statue-Lady thing? Was that enough to accuse someone of witchcraft? _Fuck,_ that whole thing really threw a wrench in her “laying low” scheme. “Help me understand the situation.”

“I’ll explain on the way.” Lisa looked around, as if expecting an interruption, although none came. “Please, Mar, the Knight-Commander, he’s…” she broke off, voice rising a little before pausing. “Something’s _terribly_ wrong.”

The two of them had known each other for nearly a month. Mar had never seen this kind of raw _fear_ written in her wide eyes and her stance, poised to snap like a rubber band. Nothing scared Lisa. Not highwaymen, not Orlesian nobles, not even, as blasphemous as it may have been, the Maker, she’d once said. If something succeeded in making Templar Recruit Lisa _visibly_ afraid, just shy of literally trembling?

Everyone else should probably be scared, too.

“Okay,” Mar said, ignoring Ghilya’s sweeping gestures of protest. “We need to stop at Julia’s, then. All my stuff is there and I gotta let Jules’ know I’m out.”

The nerves only grew more apparent in Lisa’s chuckle. “Maker, no one deserves an employee as responsible as you.”

“Yeah, skipping town overnight is a _real_ good look. I’m sure my future employers won’t ask about that at all.”

* * *

Lisa’s idea of an explanation was… plausible, honestly.

“So…” Mar paused, struggling for words. “...they figured out you’d found a mage, but they just assumed it was _me,_ because who the fuck else would it be?”

Lisa scratched the back of her neck. “Essentially, yes. I had… _inquired_ about my induction tomorrow, and, well… I don’t know, the Knight-Commander lost his _shit.”_

Mar swallowed thickly. “Did he look any different? Like, possessed-by-a-demon different?”

They kept their pace as she waited for Lisa to speak. “I’m… not sure. He _was_ Tavish, doubtlessly, but I thought his eyes were… glowing. Dimly, just barely perceptively enough to only catch your eyes if you squint.”

“Glowing?” Mar asked.

“Yeah,” Lisa said. “Glowing red. Dark enough to make you think, perhaps, it’s your imagination.”

“I believe you,” Mar said first. Then, a chill rushed down her spine, cliché as all hell. “I don’t think Ghilya should come back here even if we _do_ track her down. She didn’t tell me where she was headed, but it’s gotta be safer than here.”

She was telling the truth about that — Ghilya should be nowhere _near_ red lyrium. Everything was pointing towards the ugly truth of the matter. She remembered her playthroughs where she explored what happened to the Templars if you go to Therinfal Redoubt instead of Redcliffe. What the Envy demon would show the Herald of Andraste: a future fueled by the unhindered consumption and spread of red lyrium. She still had no idea if her knowledge of canonical events were precisely accurate in this _particular_ timeline, even if it seemed to be at this point. She could understand a default Warden sacrificing themselves. They’d encountered everything she knew they’d likely encounter, from what she’d read about the Fifth Blight herself here.

And yet… she had no way to tell if her very _presence_ here had already changed everything she knew from the moment she woke up. She had every intention to avoid doing so on purpose, but what of the effects that she could unintentionally cause? How could she avoid what was unforeseeable? Her prior knowledge, she knew, was _no_ substitute for actual future sight. If that was the case then there was no risk of fucking it up by changing things — it was fucked from the start. There wasn’t even a guarantee that she had the _power_ to change _anything_ to begin with.

Until the Breach occurred, she had no way to prove her knowledge of _potential_ _canon_ was in any way valid. It was the next event she knew would occur in every single canonical timeline.

Why, yes, she _had_ been thinking about this a lot. It’s almost like her interest in time travel as a plot point in her favorite pieces of fiction — _Dragon Age, Life is Strange,_ ARGs, etc. — prepared her to try and sort through how boggling it could get. She didn’t grasp a ton of quantum physics, but she was comfortable with thinking about the _why_ of it without needing to know the _how._

Her knowledge of the Red Templar’s canonical activity in Denerim was limited. She wanted to be nowhere near it, but what if she was the only one who knew what was happening? Was she supposed to intervene, or was she supposed to specifically _not_ intervene? How could she even stop it?

As much as she could go back and forth between the two, the real question was more easily answered: _How do I get the fuck out of this alive?_

“I have an idea where,” Lisa said. “It’s where I would go in her shoes.”

Mar smiled a little to herself. Her heart was warm with a sense of trust that she didn’t trust.

* * *

Soon, Mar was donning her cloak again, locking her empty, now-former bedroom door behind her. She only stopped at Jules’ door, saw no light through the thin mail slot, and opted to quietly drop her keyring and resignation letter, signed with a promise to get in touch with her again. There wasn’t much a difference whether she said goodbye or not, she supposed.

Lisa was waiting for her at the bar. The only people awake were the baker and the overnight guard, who paid little notice to the dead-of-morning stragglers.

Mar took a second to sit with her and actually discuss the plan. “So, how can we expect to dodge every Templar in the city?”

“Um,” Lisa said. “Be really careful.”

Mar stood up, pulling her hood up. “Okay, good enough. Where are we headed?”

“The alienage. There’s a smaller gate there, less manned, farther from the Chantry. We’ll have a much better shot leaving unnoticed. And plus,” she said with a smile, “it’s probably the one Ghilya used.”

“Probably,” Mar agreed. _Were she to have actually left._

While they were walking, the thought to confess that Ghilya never left and that she was back in her apartment crossed Mar’s mind. Maybe after they left the city. Just to see if she would be upset and have some secret betrayal foiled. Or would she just quietly contact these guys back here and let them know? That was just as likely. She was too smart for a lot of tricks. Those eyes pierced every subject they laid upon, wise enough to use her periphery as she spoke.

As if to prove it, just outside the alienage, she turned her head abruptly. Mar followed her gaze down a side alley and caught a glimpse of something shuffling around the corner. After a still few seconds, Lisa let it go and began to move forward again when she froze again in her tracks, quickly, backtracking and pushing Mar into the alley.

Once Mar spotted two Templars who had appeared up ahead, she fell into step with Lisa. “Friends of yours?”

She took a moment to reply. “Not anymore. I sort of had to… escape to come and warn you. I figured they’d be looking for me. We need to get the _fuck_ —”

Turning the corner of another block, there wasn’t enough time to react before they both collided with another patrolling duo of Templars. All four of them went to the ground in a clattering flurry, Mar being the first one to recover, taking Lisa up with her by the hand.

The day after Kacie adopted Tippa from the Humane Society, the two of them took turns running laps with her in the park. She was still nervous, still trying to run faster than either Mar or Kacie could. Once, Mar tripped and lost her grip on the leash. Tippa booked it, right towards a young couple with a stroller. Mar yelled for Tippa, called her name, to no avail.

People see a pitbull — even a three-legged one — running at them at full speed, and won’t react like they would if it were a golden.

That was the hardest Mar had run in a long time.

When the sound of horse hooves thundered lowly behind them, she drew her bow and broke that record.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yknow bc templars have a sunburst seal and they fly too close to the sun AKA right into them?? (edit: changed it from "Too Close to the Sun" to the current title bc it feels more thematically appropriate ok)
> 
> thank you for reading! please let me know what you think!


	9. Boom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar and Lisa try to make their sweet escape. Mar thinks, "why this," and finds zero answers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what’s up i’m feelin like escapism is good for me rn so i’m back here. btw the templars are DIRECTLY implied to be a metaphor in this and GUESS what????
> 
> ATAB

They made it as far as the alienage’s _vhenedahl_ before the Templars caught up to them. The gate was several blocks away, too far to make a run for it.

Mar’s lungs burned, telling her she needed to go running more often. Once they were officially boxed in, the two of them backed up against the city elves’ sacred tree. None of said elves were to be seen, it being the middle of the night and all. Lisa was whiteknuckling the hilt of her sword. Following her lead, Mar’s left hand hovered near her quiver, gripping her bow in the other, acutely aware of how hard her heart was beating. She looked around at the dozen or so Templars. No one was attacking. Yet.

Three of the Templars on horseback came to the front, the middle one clad in heavier armor than the rest of them. “Very sneaky,” he proclaimed, “hiding your mana and disguising your staff as a bow. You’re a clever one, aren’t you?”

 _Oh my god no this is_ actually _a bow._ If she wasn’t too scared to speak, that’s what she’d’ve said. Maybe he thought the pretty blue orb in the grip was a rune or magic conduit? She remembered Dalish from the Bull’s Chargers. She would _kill_ to be as inconspicuous as he thought Mar apparently was.

Looking at it now, Mar noticed dark streaks threaded through the orb. Were those there before?

“Knight-Commander, please,” Lisa tried. “She’s not a threat, stand down.”

Mar couldn’t look away from Knight-Commander Tavish’s eyes. She couldn’t quite tell how similar he looked to his NPC — he was just a white, bearded face underneath cold steel. She wouldn’t have recognized him anyway. This was _not_ the same nondescript Tavish involved in some Mage's Collective quest. Whether that was a difference of this particular universe, or if he had simply changed drastically in ten years, she couldn’t be sure, and she couldn’t bring herself to give a shit.

His eyes were red. A dim glow emanated right out of his pupils, faint but unmistakably present. He cast a sharp look at Lisa, looking almost akin to pity. “It pains me to see you be manipulated into insubordination like this, recruit.” The glare returned to Mar. “How would you explain what we saw at the ceremony tonight? Coincidence?”

_LITERALLY, YES??_

“All I said,” Lisa said, “was that I wasn’t certain if I wanted to start taking lyrium. Maybe there’s another way to—”

“Enough,” Tavish interjected. Then, he sighed, as if burdened with a heavy task. “You’ve spoken up in the past about your chronic discomfort of disciplining your charges, among other tenets of your duties. I’ve been _more_ than patient with you. But this?” He shook his head slowly. “This shows a dire weakness in your commitment to the Order. It’s clear to me that your mind has been altered by this _demon,_ and you’re just letting it happen.”

“It hasn’t been altered,” she argued, “it’s been _enlightened.”_ She motioned to the ring of Templars surrounding them, squaring her shoulders back. “You think _I’m_ the one being manipulated? I’m the only one openly questioning the way of things, and you’re trying to silence me by threatening an innocent person! I thought I would be able to help if I understood you better, but that’s not how this works, is it?” The fierce resolve in her eyes blazed far brighter than the unsettling red glow of his. “I can’t change things from the inside by myself if I’m trapped in the same way the rest of you are. I can’t be a part of this system without contributing to the violence it creates. I see that now.”

Mar had to hide the shaky smile on her face by biting her lip. Her bravery and intelligence were untamable, just as a proper lioness should be. It was probably gonna get them both killed, but at least they’d be dying for what’s right.

Bravery is stupid and wonderful like that.

He looked like he’d hoped that she’d change her mind. That hope froze over and died when he frowned somberly and drew his sword. Almost simultaneously, the rest of his men did too. “Alison de Montfort and Marlaina Andrade,” he said, tone detached and calculated, “you are under arrest by the Templar Order. Failure to comply will be subject to the use of deadly force.”

It was as if her body moved without her commanding it to do so. When Lisa drew her longsword and raised her shield, Mar knocked an arrow and stood behind her, taking aim for the nearest enemy.

She wasn’t sure if she was capable of killing someone in self-defense — in both the mental and in the skill level sense. She’d be lying to herself if she pretended this was still just a video game. But she knew she wanted to live. She knew she would do anything to get back home.

And she knew she wouldn’t go down without a fight.

“Seize them!” Tavish cried, and the scene erupted.

The hours spent training came through as motion sequences not dissimilar from dance steps. While Lisa knew sword and shield like her own flesh, the archery lessons she could impart were rudimentary at best. Still, it was enough, as Mar rolled, dodged, and ran around, standing and shooting only when she was at a safe enough distance. Didn’t get many chances to, since she needed to get pretty far away in order to have enough time to draw, aim, and shoot, but she got in more than she expected herself to.

Lisa was able to fend off two or three of her newly former brothers-in-arms at a time. Dogpiling wasn’t in their arsenal, preferring to give enough space to each other to let their swords fly. They were lucky that the thick trunk of the _vhenedahl_ could cover their rear, shielding their flank.

They _were_ losing ground, though, as the circle steadily enclosed around them. Mar managed to stick a few limbs with arrows, but that barely deterred them. They wouldn’t last long like this. Desperate, she cast a quick look around, spotting a break in the Templars’ formation, right at the edge. Without time to aim, Mar scooped up some loose dirt at her feet, yelled to Lisa _“Allons-y!”_ and made a break for it, chucking the dirt in the Templar’s face as she dashed between him and the _vhenedahl._

Lisa used her shield to bash away the ones who tried apprehending her, right on Mar’s heels. They headed for the direction of the alienage gate, taking pauses to stop and shoot. She managed to down two more foot soldiers. Soon, though, the two on horseback gave chase. With a little more distance, Lisa slung her shield on her back and struck an honest-to-Maker power stance, holding her sword with two hands. As Mar’s quiver slowly depleted, picking off the slower targets, she watched in awe as the first horseman reached her. In one swift, fluid motion, she sidestepped away from his attempt at simply trampling her, bringing her sword up with lightning speed through a gap in the rider’s armor into his chest, then pulling it out just as fast. The horse kept running while the bloodied body slipped out of the saddle, crashing to the ground like an armored sack of potatoes.

A sort of horrified thrill shot through her as it happened — half relieved because it meant one less person trying to kill them, half shocked because _holy shit I just watched my friend kill someone,_ she thought _._ It was over almost as soon as it began. As usual, Mar shoved her feelings deep down below and focused on her aim, felling the other rider, getting her in the knee. _Oh god I hope she wasn’t an adventurer like me._

Half a dozen Templars were still pursuing them, and as they both turned to get more distance, Mar and Lisa found another dozen pouring out of an alley, cutting them off. A wall of armor formed between them and the path to freedom.

“Shit,” Lisa said, her breath heavy.

Mar bit her tongue, searching wildly again for an escape. Her heart sank, hearing the others approach behind them. Her bow was up, arrow aimed for anyone drawing close as her back pressed against Lisa’s. She’d never felt so much like cornered prey in her life.

Tavish sat on his horse behind his men, looking down his nose at the two of them. “I’m giving you one last chance, Lisa.” His voice boomed, full of smug satisfaction in knowing he’d won the fight. “Turn the demon in, and I promise no harm will come to either of you.”

Mar barked a cynical laugh. “Well, that’s just a bold-faced lie.”

It hit her before she took her next breath. The knee-jerk association she made was thinking she’d been hit by a train from the inside of her skull. Her body shot into a rigid line of immobilized tension, like a raucous circuit of electricity found a home in her muscles. She opened her mouth, choking out a sound of shock and nothing else.

 _“Cher Créator,_ _assez!”_ Lisa called out as the feeling ripped itself away, collapsing her to her hands and knees. It was as if someone just turned her inside-out, and then outside-out, continuing in the same direction, in the span of two seconds.

So _that_ was what a Holy Smite felt like.

Her body hurt. Everywhere. Through it, probably thanks to the adrenaline, she lifted her head and met Tavish’s red-eyed glare, flashing a little brighter now.

Lisa spat an Orlesian curse into the dirt. “Are you okay?” she asked over her shoulder.

“No,” she said. She forced herself to stand, bow clenched in one hand and an arrow in the other, not taking her eyes off of Tavish. “But I will be.”

Mar had seen people do magic before, but had no way of knowing what it felt like to conjure or cast. She’d imagined there would be some sort of tactile flow of energy, indistinguishable from the blood in her veins, but somehow distinct.

When a wave of ice crashed over half of Tavish’s men, she thought she’d accidentally discovered that she was a mage. Was that all it took? Staring really hard at someone? And then, she caught sight of a familiar face clad in unfamiliar robes, wielding an unfamiliar staff, a pale blue quartz shining from its tip.

“Ghilya!” Lisa exclaimed, delighted. “You came back!”

“Actually,” Ghilya said, pulling her staff up, “I never left.”

“Wait, what?”

Ghilya avoided answering the question by swirling her staff over her head and swinging it down in a graceful batting motion. Crystalline streaks sparked wildly from the quartz, sending another glacier careening towards the surprised men behind Mar and Lisa. “Run!”

Mar certainly didn’t need to be told twice, dashing through the break in the blockade. Shouts and hollers went up in the air, Tavish calling for _the mage’s bloody head on a pike!_ She looked back to see every Templar converge on Ghilya. She stopped and turned. She needed to go back.

Ghilya held her staff up with two hands, back stock straight, whispering an incantation. Her eyes flashed once, and an honest-to-god nor’easter exploded outwards from the blue quartz. All the Templars ragdolled in a vortex, hit by howling gales and vicious hail. Knight-Commander Tavish lost control of his horse as it reared back, spooked, and took off away from the blizzard.

Oh. Okay, maybe she didn’t need help. Holy shit, Ghilya.

“Hurry!” Lisa called, wrangling one of the horses left riderless. “Get on!”

 _Oh shit I’ve never actually ridden a horse before,_ was all Mar could think as she stepped into the stirrup and hauled herself into the saddle, grabbing the little stub on the front of it. She clung to it, feeling her hips wobble.

Ghilya came running towards them, panting, and only when she was close enough did Mar notice the sheen of sweat on her brow. She did the magic equivalent of a suicide sprint, it looked like, because Lisa circled back and caught her just as she stumbled and nearly ate shit on the cobblestone.

“Man,” Lisa said, helping her onto the same saddle as Mar. “Good thing I didn’t try and arrest you, huh? That was incredible!”

Ghilya managed a cheeky smile through her labored breathing. “I had a whole line planned about meeting your Maker and everything.” She wrapped her arms securely around Mar’s waist, her whole body resting against her. Mar did everything she could to keep her balance. Oh, shit, did she think she knew how to ride? Oh boy, hopefully that was something she could just… pick up on the fly.

Lisa laughed, jumping onto the other available horse as confidently as everything else she does. “I would’ve secretly thought that was hilarious. Now come on, it’s _been_ time to leave.”

They took off at a hearty canter. She was slightly anchored with Ghilya’s added weight, able to sit up shakily. As they rounded the next corner, the gate appearing at the far end of the road, Mar’s ears pricked up to the sound of a third set of horse hooves. She and Ghilya looked back at the same time and saw a _severely_ pissed off Knight-Commander Tavish, his pale horse galloping after them at full speed.

All three of them kicked into high gear, but he was too fast.

The gate was still too far away.

Lacking other options, Mar handed Ghilya the rein, heart pounding. “Here, switch.” As least awkwardly as they could manage, Ghilya slid onto the front of the saddle while Mar finagled herself to sit back-to-back with her, drawing her bow, feeling the fletching brush her cheek. Tavish was catching up, eyes now vibrantly pulsing with a deep red light. Time the breaths, hold half in, aim…

She lurched, balance faltering, just barely managing to save herself from flying off. She sat back up and tried again, but her aim wobbled dramatically. This wasn’t going to work.

She needed to get a better shot.

“Ah, shit.” Mar breathed in quickly, and then out. “Keep going,” she said to Ghilya and tucked her belongings close to her chest.

Ghilya said, “What? Wh—” and before she could stop her, Mar leapt off the horse and rolled onto the ground. Shoulder-first, like Lisa taught her. She heard her call out her name, but didn’t hear the horses change pace. Good. She stood up, drew her bow again, and breathed.

The Knight-Commander smiled wide, sword poised to hack her apart. His lack of hesitation was the most disturbing part of it.

 _Fuck._ His armor left her very few gaps to target. The most she could do was distract him, slowing him enough to buy her friends more time to escape.

That’d have to be good enough. With an odd sense of calmness, she aimed, timed her breath, and when she let the arrow loose, she felt it go _way_ wide.

Suddenly, the orb in the bow’s grip lit up a bright, silvery blue and _burned_ her palm. She hissed through her teeth, but didn’t let go.

The arrow, enveloped in the same light, _curved_ _in the air,_ re-correcting its own course…

And drove itself right into Tavish’s eye. His wild grin froze in place, his body slumped over. He was dead before he crashed to the ground, sword still clutched in hand, landing with a heavy thump and loud clatter of metal.

…

_…UM?_

Mar wasn’t aware of her jaw hanging open until she snapped back to herself, just in time to clamber onto the horse’s vacant saddle. She struggled for a moment to get her bearings, nearly slipping a couple times, and ended up mounting backwards. The wind whistled past her, tickling her ears, but everything else was steeped in silence. She stared at the motionless body and the tail end of the arrow sticking straight up from the eye socket. No light emanated from it or her bow, looking like perfectly normal pieces of weaponry again. The streaks she saw earlier weren’t there anymore.

When she repositioned herself to face forward again, Lisa and Ghilya were both looking over at her, slowing, just as speechless.

“Sweet Maker,” Lisa said once she caught up. “What _happened?”_

Mar was not quite caught up with reality yet. “I… don’t know.”

She meant it. It was nice to not have to lie about how much she knew. She _really_ would’ve liked to know. There were so many things she had inexplicably vast swaths of knowledge on, but anything actually relevant to her situation here was beyond her grasp.

_Figures._

They trotted up to the city gate, where a dwarf in leathers stood, two daggers on his hips and a messenger bag on his shoulder, embroidered with the Royal Seal mabari. “I’ve a message from His Grace,” he announced, looking up to address her, “to one Marlaina Andrade. You are she, ser?”

How… What? Did Alistair know she’d be leaving tonight? How’d he know which gate she’d use?

“Who are you?” she said.

“My name is Jerim,” he replied. He had thick chestnut hair done up in an intricate braid, a bushy beard decorated with tiny plaits, and a jet black geometric tattoo tracing its way down his forehead and over his right eye. “I work for the King and Queen as a courier. You must be Ms. Andrade?”

He had to have recognized her if he was at the All Soul’s Day ceremony, which he undoubtedly was. Everyone in the goddamn city was. “Yes.”

“Excellent.” The courier produced a brown envelope from his satchel, handing it up to her. “Have a lovely morning, sers.” And with that, Jerim walked back into the alienage, towards the palace.

She stared at the envelope, twine tied around it like a gift. The front was blank. Emerald green wax sealed the back, bearing the symbol of an oak tree. All she could do was shake her head and slip it into her bag. File it under the _Deal With Later_ box in her mind.

Neither of her friends commented. They left the limits of Denerim, heading towards the dawn creeping up the horizon.

From the Void, her thoughts went to where Solas might’ve gone. West was a good start, since East was the ocean. Maybe he’d stopped somewhere. Maybe they’d catch up to him. Maybe he could tell her about the bow she’d found in the old ruin she’d woken up in and just picked up like it wasn’t some kind of stupidly powerful Ancient Elvhen artifact or _whatever the fuck THAT was._

_I mean, if anyone would know, he would… right?_

* * *

Camp wasn’t made until late in the afternoon. All of them were running on little sleep, but the more distance they put between them and Denerim, the better. They only stopped once at the smallest village with a general goods merchant for supplies. They found a decent overhang far enough from the border of the Imperial Highway, sheltering them from the potential rainstorm gathering.

They'd briefly discussed whether they should take the North Road towards Amaranthine, and Mar worried that she might have to solidify her backstory. But then, Ghilya raised a good point: Redcliffe. The West Road would take them through the Hinterlands, which, while filled with mages and Templars hacking and zapping each other to death indiscriminately, would lead them to the sanctuary city for mages.

It seemed as safe a place as any. Mar wondered if she’d meet Grand Enchanter Fiona there. Huh… Maybe she could help Mar with her situation? After all, she _was_ a powerful mage in her own right. That might be all she really needed to yeet herself back to Earth. Somehow.

That was only a two days’ journey by horseback away, according to Lisa, so for now they rested. When Mar slid off previously-Tavish’s horse, she collapsed into a pile of jellied muscle held together by sinew and bone. As if that Holy Smite hadn’t left her a wreck, her legs felt like they’d been split apart from riding so long. Her balance started failing not long before stopping, almost falling off the damn animal more than once, much to its annoyance. She just groaned into the dirt, closing her eyes.

“Hey now,” Lisa said, “don’t go passing out on me. When was the last time you rode a horse?”

Mar lifted her heavy eyelids, finding Lisa’s face haloed by her red hair, free of the neat bun it’d been in. “Define ‘rode,’ because if you mean like we just did? Never.”

“Ugh, I’m feeling it too,” she heard Ghilya say somewhere nearby. “Dear gods, it’s been a while.”

The rest of the daylight was used to scavenge wood for a fire and a lean-to, along with hunting down dinner. With the horses unsaddled, brushed, and secured, camp was made swiftly. Mar helped Ghilya skin and gut the three rabbits Lisa’d brought back, and by dusk they were all sitting around the campfire, roasting the skewered rodents ever so slowly.

The sizzle of dripping fat had Mar salivating. Small game was easy and plentiful, and this was fresher than any meat she’d find at a New Seasons or Wholefoods. They ate in silence for a while, watching the fire, listening to the crickets’ choir coming from the brush around them. There was so much to say, but Mar wasn’t up for discussing _any_ of them just yet. The past 24 hours had been a whirlwind-and-a-half. Everything in her head mushed together like a sloppy mud cake, refusing to be handled and processed until she got some rest.

“So,” Lisa said, breaking the silence, “you never left the city?” She looked at Ghilya, then Mar. “Did you know?”

Ghilya was picking food out of her teeth with her skewer. “No, she didn’t,” she responded, preemptively interrupting Mar. “I told her I was leaving, but really I just hid until she left.”

She was covering for her. For the split second Mar considered letting her, — how would anyone be able to refute it? — she held her breath. But her exhale was used to say, “No, no I knew. I appreciate it,” she said to Ghilya. “But I did lie to you, Lisa. I’m sorry.”

Seeing the disappointment on her face hurt more than keeping up the lie, that was for sure.

“But only to protect me,” Ghilya threw in.

Her gaze hardened as she turned to her. “Like you just did?”

“Yes,” she replied firmly. “Lying to protect yourself and others is more justifiable than not.”

For a moment, it seemed like she was ready to bicker, but instead, Lisa’s shoulders sunk. Not in poorly accepted defeat, but in dignified resignation. “You’re right.” She looked at Ghilya, and then Mar. “I was unworthy of your trust. But I want to be from now on, because I know that I trust you. Both of you.”

“You already are to me,” Mar said, reaching over to put her hand over Lisa’s. “I’m pretty sure you saved my life.”

“Pretty sure?” she asked, raising a brow.

Mar snorted and pushed her away by her bicep. “Yeah, like I could’ve taken them on by myself.”

If there was a question of _Couldn’t you?_ in light of unexplainable archery-related phenomena, it went unsaid. She felt her pulse beat in her right hand, and she closed a loose fist over her lightly singed palm and fingers.

The firelight cast a shadow that beautifully defined Lisa’s cheekbones with her smile. Slowly, though, she sobered. They all sat in that quiet moment, until Lisa spoke up again. “I can’t believe…” she started, before pausing thoughtfully. Her body was still turned towards Mar, but her eyes had drifted to the campfire. “I didn’t think I was causing harm when I reported a mage because I never had to see what came after. I thought I was protecting them.”

“But you weren’t.” Mar’s tone was matter-of-fact, free of venom. “When they give you Templar training and a sword, they give you power over mages. Whether or not it’s intended to protect them, it does create a power imbalance.”

“And it gave me unfair control over them,” Lisa finished. “I could ignore that advantage, and I did. I shouldn’t have.”

Mar gave a small, wry smile. She knew Lisa was smarter than she was cruel.

She faced Ghilya, the sincerity in her eyes overflowing. “Without you, we wouldn’t have made it. If there’s any way I can repay you, just tell me and I will.”

Ghilya kept her eyes down, sullenly contemplating the dirt. A little smirk appeared on her face. “Denouncing the Templars works well enough for me, but if I think of something, I’ll let you know.”

They smiled at each other, and for the first time, Mar felt like they could truly be friends with each other.

She wondered if _she_ ever could truly have a bond with people here, considering her false identity. Was that a false pretense? It wasn’t like she was being anyone but herself. They were both getting a 100% Friend of Mar treatment, with support and care and everything. She wouldn’t suddenly become a different person if she told them about the transuniversal existence thing.

_Hm. I wonder if Blackwall ever felt like this._

She propped her chin up on her palm, elbow on her knee. She was a little surprised at the thought. But it made sense why she didn’t jump to Solas like she habitually did — he was _very much_ a different person come the Trespasser DLC. Blackwall was still… himself, at least, after the truth came out. Thom Rainier was never a companion she wrote a _whole_ lot about, although she did very much enjoy him as a character. She couldn’t remember if she ever _didn’t_ pardon him in a playthrough.

Considering that she was lying to people in a concerningly parallel way to his, it really wasn’t that surprising. She was down with identity theft, so of course she was gonna take up a false one to avoid the risk of seeming dangerous. Which, admitting to the knowledge that she _did_ have, she would appear _very_ dangerous. At least that wasn’t stealing a whole person’s identity. She just woke up as herself, except Elf somehow. She still had no idea where to even start with that.

The fire was hot on Mar’s cheeks. And then she had another thought.

 _...This_ was _her own body, right?_

“Mar, hey?”

She blinked, found herself leaning closer to the fire than she thought she’d been, and sat up straight. She blinked again, harder, snapping out of a daze, then looked at Lisa. “Oh, um. Sorry, what was that?”

“I asked if there something on your mind?”

She gave a dry smile. “What isn’t, honestly?”

“Fair.”

Mar laid down in the dirt, settling in to watch the sheet of clouds roll through. Her eyes focused easily in the lowlight, an aspect gained with existence as an elf. She didn’t know how she got here, so she didn’t know if she was transported in her Earth body or if it was like a body-snatcher thing. Both options were weird, but this entire situation was already very weird. The possibility of inhabiting a body that looked _exactly_ like hers, but wasn’t created on Earth? Fuck it, could be, how would she know?

Yeah. There was a lot to think about.

It wasn’t until they took first watch together that Lisa brought it up. “So… The Hero of Ferelden lookalike thing.”

Mar was chewing on a stick of dried venison, and continued to chew as she looked Lisa dead in the eye and held her head up with her second knuckles, awkward-prom-pose style.

“...Can you tell me what that’s about?”

Mar swallowed as she shook her head. “I would if I could. But I have no clue why _that’s_ a thing, and—” here, she paused to sigh, then continued, “And frankly, it freaks me out, too. I think it's a coincidence, but what do I know?”

The fire reflected off of Lisa’s eyes. With the warm lighting, her irises looked more green than blue. “I trust you, but I don’t know if I buy that."

To that, Mar shrugged. “I don’t expect you to. It’s the worst explanation, but I really am clueless.”

She contemplated something for a minute or so. “Keeper Lanaya thought you might’ve been a demon, you know.”

“I don’t blame her.” Mar pressed her lips together. “...What do _you_ think it is?”

Lisa’s lower lip ceased being chewed upon as she collected her thoughts. “I think… you’re her long lost twin sister?”

 _Oh my GOD am I in a Parent Trap thing? Is that what this is??_ Metaphorically, — although she badly wished physically, too — she strangled whoever was responsible for running this shitshow. _But fine, let’s think about_ this _now_

She let it turnover in her head a few times, and then slowly her expression shifted from pensive to unbridled amusement. “Holy _shit,_ am I her estranged sibling? Were we like, separated at birth?” She was genuinely excited just to potentially have an answer. Maybe this was why she was here? _Fuck._ _That’s cheesy as shit._

If it even _was_ a Parent Trap thing. She had no proof, of course. That was an Enquirer-level headline, — _THIS person is the Hero of Ferelden’s secret twin!_ — wildly fake and unreliable tabloidism. Too far of a reach to assert it as the truth. So she threw it a hard “Maybe,” and put it away. It could be a lot of things.

“I don’t know,” Lisa said, throwing her hands up. “That’s the best I got!”

She heaved a sigh, dropping her head between her knees. “Well, if it were between yours and Lanaya’s theories, I _really_ hope it’s yours.”

She gave a little laugh through her nose. “I hope the answer isn’t very complicated.”

“Sammmmmme.”

* * *

After another two hours, Mar retired to one of the two thin bedrolls they'd picked up. Sleeping so close to the ground wasn’t gonna be fun for her body, but going without the comfort of a mattress in exchange for survival was fine by her. She preferred falling asleep on her back anyways, using her cloak as a cocoon and her satchel as a pillow.

As tired as she was, sleep evaded her. She kept her eyes closed, her body relaxed, but her mind refused to slow. She thought about the red glow in Tavish’s eyes. Her throat and chest felt tight, like she had gas, but nothing was coming out.

Denerim’s new lyrium supply was red lyrium. Mar would bet her life on it. It’d been procured by Lord Seeker Lucius, which probably meant he was already in cahoots with Corypheus. Had the Envy demon already taken his place? She wasn’t really sure when specific events happened pre-Breach, but that point was sort of moot. It was bad either way.

What could she do about it? Leave an anonymous tip somewhere? Would the royal couple look into it? She didn’t know who else she could tell.

Alistair’s envelope, tucked between the pages of her journal, burned a hole in her mind. She hadn’t touched it since Jerim handed it to her. Hearing what the Grey Warden she knew and loved so dearly had to say to her might help her decide. She had _no_ idea how the whole debacle had affected him, but she suspected that seeing a carbon copy of your dead friend was a jarring experience.

This was gonna make it… _somewhat challenging_ to blend into the background. There was no good explanation for it. What would she do if someone else made that connection, having known what Mahariel looked like? She could throw ‘em a “Oh, I get that a lot,” or take Lisa’s idea and spin it as a light joke. Brush it off. It wasn’t _that_ big of a deal. How significant was her resemblance, really?

Mildly, Mar wished she could’ve met Mahariel, wished she knew what her relationships were like, who she romanced if she did. Why she refused Morrigan’s Ritual and sacrificed herself to destroy Urthemiel. Her head started playing through the events of Origins again, and the familiarity was enough to finally lull her to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOOOM HEADSHOT
> 
> thank you so much for reading! take care of yourself, we're stronger together. i’ll update again uhhh whenever lmao


	10. Radio Static

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar, Lisa, and Ghilya continue their journey to Redcliffe. Mar lacks some connections while she gains others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [throws you 6400 words in appreciation of your patience] happy new year my good bitchhhhh
> 
> i feel like a lot of internal dialogue is a bit of a refresher in this one, but feel free to go back and re-read stuff if you're tuning back in after the couple months since the last update. it helps to remind myself what's happening while i'm writing, so hopefully it doesn't sound too redundant to new readers!

“So,” he said, “what do you think we’re here for?”

Mar bit off half an apple slice, sending a glance to the man sitting on the branch the opposite side of the trunk from hers. She met his expectant gaze as she wiped an escaping drip of tart juice off her chin. “We’re hunters. I hope you haven’t forgotten or this will be much more challenging than it should be.”

The man laughed, an attractive smile accompanying the clear tone. “Fret not, _lethallan,”_ he said with a bright, twinkling eye. “I meant it in a more general, existential way. What’s it all for? Why are we _here,_ on Thedas?”

She laughed. “Are you asking me the meaning of life to make small talk? Who are you, the next Hahren?”

“Creators, end me now if I sound so dull!” From beneath the mature exterior he’d grown into, she recognized the boyish charm she’d come to know so well. A lock of sandy hair fell over his face as he turned away to scan the brook below. A herd of deer native to the region had been spotted by scouts earlier that day. If they were still around, they were bound to show up here eventually. “I’m simply curious to know what you think.”

“Well, what are your thoughts?”

“I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.” His eyes found hers again, shining like polished turquoise, eyebrow quirking up in a particularly saucy manner.

Her smile was unstoppable, interest always sparked with a little provocation. “I think,” she said, taking care to keep an ear open for hoofsteps. “I think everyone will leave some footprint on the world, whether they were meant to or not. Gods willing, it’ll be more positive than negative. But other than that… I couldn’t say. I haven’t thought of it much.”

His head fell, deigning to observe the bit of bark his fingernail was absently picking at. “Do you believe that someone might have such a profound effect on the world, that it will be drastically changed for everybody in it?”

She popped the last of the apple into her mouth, chewing thoughtfully. “I’m not sure. Why are you asking, _lethallin?”_

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It’s… just something I’ve been thinking about. I know we’re only hunters, but I…” His eyes went back to her warily. “Promise not to call me crazy?”

“Promise,” Mar said, summoning a gentle look and giving him full attention. Her heart had never been more open to someone before him, and she knew he felt the same. “Even if you were, I’d still value whatever it is you had to say.”

A soft affection shone in his expression as he silently sighed. “I feel… called to a higher purpose than the simple life envisioned by our clan. I value our people and our traditions — of course I do, that can never change — but don’t you ever wonder if there’s something more for us out there? Something we could do to change the world, forever?”

Mar regarded him thoughtfully. _For us._ He had such grand ideas for the future, and she was still included in them. She could picture it no other way, either. “Like what, do you suppose?”

He paused, searching for words. “I keep thinking about our history. About the Ancient Elvhen. When the People were united and every one of us was free. If there were a way to bring it all back, I would stop at nothing to do so, wouldn’t you?”

_That’s not true. We weren’t all free._

Her vision swam. Her hand found the trunk to steady herself, she was sure, but she didn’t feel it under her palm. The grip on her bow tightened as a wobble threatened her balance.

 _“Lethallan?”_ she heard him say.

 _“But the People,”_ another voice said, pained. She knew that voice. The words were Elvhen, but she understood them — how did she understand them? _“They need me.”_

Her eyes refused to stay open, contrary to all effort put forth otherwise. Trying to speak felt like talking through a mouth full of sap. “Tamlen, I…”

She felt herself falling, heard someone yell, heard a stampede of hooves running away.

* * *

Mar’s eyes flew open with a panicked jolt, bracing for impact, breath as quick as her heart rate. Her bedroll had long since begun cooling, sweat-drenched, her jaw chattering. Slowly, she felt the cloak around her, saw the fire’s glow through the tent canvas. She paused to take a handful of timed breaths, and then went for her journal to write as much as she could before her time in solitude was up. The firelight was just enough to let her make out letters on the page. She once again thanked the lowlight vision gifted to her elven form, allowing her to start scribbling in a convincingly third-grade level of neatness without blowing her waking status with a lit candle.

…What _was_ that? Was that what a dream on Thedas was like, or was that something… else? Had she been in the Fade? Did she just witness a memory, or had her mind conjured it? Was that…

Tamlen. Mahariel’s childhood friend. Was that a figment, or a spirit? How could anyone recognize a spirit or demon when they couldn’t tell they were dreaming? That dream alone felt more real than most of Mar’s waking hours here. She had been unquestioning in her duty, in the identity set before her in the dream; she had 100% bought the idea that she was a Dalish hunter.

Fuck, not just any hunter. She’d just dreamt from the perspective of Lyna Mahariel.

She could only assume she’d heard her own memory of Solas’ voice — it’s the exact line he’d said to Flemeth during that post-credit scene in _Inquisition._ She wasn’t certain how Somniari magic worked here, having very limited direct experience to confirm her general knowledge of the Fade. If he was ever able to see her dreams, it’d be much safer for her to not dream of her life on Earth. Because, one: it’s unfortunately difficult, though not impossible, to use that bit as a plot point in a manner that’s personally fun to write. And, two: she had _no_ desire for him to suspect she was aware of his true identity, which may come to light in having to explain the rest of her shit.

She’d begun thinking of… half-truths, at least, to be able to tell him. She’s had plenty of practice pretending not to see someone or recognize them on the street. Living in small town after small town honed some… very normal skills, surely, in hiding your true self and keeping up an image to cloak yourself in. It was her normal state, preferring to keep to herself in most of her living situations. Not being thought of twice was simply a natural occurrence, one she preferred, really.

Her right hand had started to cramp by the time sunlight started bleeding through the canvas. She wrote down every idea, every theory. What personal information or narrative details she could safely give away if it might help at all, for one or both of them. She laid down, making herself keep her eyes closed for the last half hour before it was time to get up. Focused on breathing, the smell of fir and dirt, the dry, warm clothes she’d changed into.

 _“Why are we_ here, _on Thedas?”_

“Buddy,” she whispered, eyes shut tight. “They won’t even let _me_ know why I’m here, and I’m an _alien.”_

* * *

One question of hers grew closer to being answered when Ghilya took her hunting. She led her down a deer path through the trees opposite the overhang just before sunrise. Not a mile into the enclosing forest was a brook, and of course, terrifyingly, it was the exact same brook she’d seen in her dream. She looked up, and sure enough, she spotted the tree branches that she and Tamlen had been sitting on, a broken one coincidentally beneath the one she’d sat.

Oh, Tamlen…

He must have been real in this universe. Mar remembered what happened when you played the Dalish Warden and what happened to Mahariel’s childhood best friend-slash-potential lover because oh my GOD that was always so awful. Mar wondered what Lyna Mahariel’s relationship was like to him. Was it what she’d… not just pictured, but straight-up _felt_ about him in the dream? The only person she’d ever felt so secure in her feelings for them — and in their feelings for her — was Angie. Being awake, she felt nothing of the sort for a person long passed, but there was still a sort of ache in her chest thinking about him.

She must’ve tapped into something in the area. No idea how, but something had to have changed between last night and the time she’d slept before that. That was… in Ghilya’s room in Denerim. It seemed like such a long time ago but it was literally yesterday morning.

“So,” Ghilya said, grabbing her attention. “You wanna know how I kept hidden in Denerim for so long? Remember how Templars can sniff out mages like the spoiled bloodhounds they’re trained to be?”

Mar pressed her lips together. “I know they _can,_ but I’m not sure how it all… works.”

“As in, magic in general?” A nod. “Okay… imagine your body as a pool of mana,” she said, gesturing towards herself, “and the Fade as another, _much_ bigger pool of mana. An ocean, maybe.” Her hands moved outwards, miming a bubble around her. “All of us possess a connection to the Fade, and when mages dream, we gain mana from it. I like to think of it like a river current, and being a mage as having a boat to take upstream and catch mana in a net.”

The brook was only knee-deep, but as Ghilya swept her staff around in sequence with some quiet formation of words, a bubbling of movement turned the lazy little trickle into a rambunctious creek. The white rabbit fur on her pauldrons fluttered at the tips, evidence of her force magic in the water’s ripples and swell.

They’d discussed this hunting plan on the way here. Mar’s bow was out and ready for Ghilya’s signal. Once given, a massive crash sent water and fish sailing up in the air, allowing Mar to pick a few off at the point of highest suspension.

It helped Mar’s aim and procured food for breakfast. “Another reason to do this,” Ghilya said after stringing the ample number of fish together and stored them in the insulated crate she’d brought. “The more of the Fade’s mana I store, the bigger the pool of mana within me is. My pa taught me how to shift it around, how to keep my aura wrapped up in a ball that I could use to play keep-away from detection magic. Stopped being a game when I saw what happened if you slipped up. The more magic I use, the smaller my mana-pool is. The smaller the pool, the easier it is to hide, see?”

Mar nodded, casting another look around before they left. “Even dwarves and Tranquil people have connections?”

“Most people wouldn’t think so.” Her gait was leisurely, easy for Mar to match. “From what I can tell, every living thing possesses one, but where a non-mage human or elf’s is simply too weak to transfer mana, a dwarf or Tranquil’s connecting river is, for the sake of the metaphor, dammed up completely.” She was smiling, although it couldn’t have been terribly easy to talk about, having only ever had Julian to discuss these things with. “What you and Lisa saw me doing was examining my pa’s connection. I thought there might’ve been something to the timing of All Souls’ Day. We had some books on Tranquility, but we’ve never been able to figure out how to reverse it. There’s probably something we’re missing that I doubt we’d find, even with our more… morally ambiguous suppliers.”

“What do you know about Tranquility?” Mar asked. “Do you know who invented it in the first place?” While she wished she could outright tell people answers — _Yeah, you just need a spirit to touch your pa’s mind, but no big deal, that’s a secret entrusted to Lord Seekers that I should have no conceivable way of knowing —_ it would probably be safer to just drop little hints or ask the right questions. Lord Seeker Lucius currently had the Book of Secrets that contained the specific piece of knowledge Ghilya was talking about. Was he at Caer Oswin if the Envy Demon was already in his place commanding the Templars?

“It was created by the Seekers of Truth,” she answered correctly. Girl knew her shit, that was for sure. “Pa, before he was taken to the Circle, was as regular as any of us. He’s not a different person, really, just spiritually disabled. Even if he doesn’t laugh, he still has his sense of humor. He still protected me as best he could.” Her smile was a warm curl in her lip. “Still loves me, just more as an action than as a feeling.”

Their conversation drifted towards other topics, but Mar’s mind dwelled a little on Ghilya’s explanation of her firsthand experience as a mage. She’d thought before that her lack of dreams was due to some severed connection to the Fade, and it seemed like that was still the best working theory, however vague. Dwarves and Tranquil both _had_ a connection to the Fade, but got cut off. She vaguely recalled Shaper Valta from _The Descent_ DLC gaining magical abilities through that whole ordeal with the Titan. If she dreamed regularly from now on, then her connection seemed to have been re-established by something between now and Denerim, possibly something similar. Of course, if last night was just a one-off thing, maybe it was due to having slept in proximity to this specific area? That’s how Solas said he’d traveled the Fade — snooze in different places and you can find out the history of the space. Like tuning into a radio station.

Man, she missed jazz radio.

* * *

With Ghilya’s mana depleted to an acceptable level for traveling the open world, the three of them took off right after feeding and watering themselves and the horses. The morning fog was lingering, and they hoped to make a good distance before needing to stop and rest again.

Tavish’s horse, a dappled grey named “Foxglove” — according to a plain iron tag on her harness — tolerated Mar’s riding considerably more after a good night’s rest. She was far more forgiving of how Mar clunkily wriggled to readjust her posture. What nearly got her thrown was slipping a little too sharply off the stirrup, but other than that, Foxglove was a perfect lady.

The other two — white-all-over William and chestnut-with-cream-speckles Margaret — behaved much more appreciatively towards the more-experienced riders. Did horses feel pride? Was Foxglove disappointed to go from a fully-trained Knight-Commander to some rando who’d only ever ridden a horse at Girl Scout camp when she was eleven, and even then no faster than a canter and no longer than a couple hours?

And now she was thinking of said Knight-Commander. In-game, he was, essentially, to whom one would narc on the Mage’s Collective. God, it’d been so long since she’d played Origins, but she’d played enough to remember that he wasn’t an evil sort of person, Templar though he may be. Have been. Haha, holy shit, she killed a named NPC. She didn’t know that was possible; she didn’t know she believed it impossible until it happened. God. Good fucking God.

He had to have recognized Mahariel in her. And if she nailed the look well enough for a Dalish Keeper to believe her a demon at first, it was no wonder that Tavish thought the same. But where a Keeper had the notion to stop and make certain, a Knight-Commander was more inclined to stab first, ask questions later. Man… Cops is the same.

For the most part. Mar came up the rear in travel formation, Ghilya and Lisa riding beside each other in front of her, talking amicably. She regarded Lisa, pale red braid cascading down her back as she laughed at some joke about lyrium deposits. Mar’s presence on Thedas not only caused the death of Tavish, but also Lisa’s departure from the Templars. Ghilya’s departure from Denerim. Without even meaning to, her existence here changed the trajectory of three lives that would doubtlessly have remained the same if not for her. Lisa could’ve become just another nameless Red Templar NPC, Ghilya some unnamed casualty, Tavish a powerful conduit for the unhindered spread of blighted lyrium within the Denerim Templar chapter.

The fact of it settled uncomfortably in the pit of her stomach. She hadn’t tried doing anything to make waves, and now she was riding a stolen horse. She wondered if they’d try to at least get the horses back. What was the state of the Order in Denerim, now that their Knight-Commander had an arrow in his eye? That certainly wouldn’t have happened without her, although she still had no idea how exactly that happened.

Inexplicably, her mind jumped to the letter from Alistair. The oak tree seal wasn’t directly Royal or Theirin material. It seemed more Dalish than anything, but she wasn’t sure what that meant. Not until she read it. Which she was dreading.

His face at the All Souls’ Day ceremony betrayed nothing but how supernaturally _uncomfortable_ the whole situation must have been for him. Her presence alone had visibly troubled him. If it were Orlais, someone probably could’ve played it off as her _actually_ being hired as an impersonator, just for the occasion. Her freeze response had kicked in too hard. Whiplash did that to her. She needed to work on that. She wished she’d played it off like that, but Fereldeners were no-nonsense. She wasn’t sure if anyone would’ve gone along with it, especially with a cultural distaste for Orlesian-flavored antics. Queen Anora had enough sensibility to at least continue the ceremony as normally as possible, which, while not helping King Alistair’s prickly disposition, at least allowed the whole thing to close out.

She looked like Lyna Mahariel, who died in the Battle of Denerim. Mar wasn’t supposed to know why a Warden was needed to slay an archdemon, but she did. Mar wasn’t supposed to know that Lyna didn’t _need_ to sacrifice herself, either, since Morrigan always proposed her blood magic ritual. Did she even ask Alistair to… participate? She could understand why some Wardens would elect to ignore that option, whether due to issues with blood magic, Morrigan, or simply due to the dubious nature of consent in that instance. Maybe some sort of romantic conflict?

Far from what she suspected would be the last time, Mar again wished she knew what Lyna was like as a person.

Much of the journey was spent in her own head, and her companions were more liable to let her do so than before their escape. There were a few attempts to coax her into conversation, and even when they took, she inevitably fell back into quiet rumination. Lunch consisted of dry rations on horseback, a miserable drizzle setting into their skin. She hadn’t missed the South Reach climate. Sooner they could reach the next low-profile inn, the better. The wool of Mar’s cloak was a godsend, keeping her warm despite the damp.

The inn they were hoping for wasn’t found until the tail end of dusk, after everything had been good and thoroughly soaked by the intensifying rain. A tiny town just past what remained of Lothering — no longer blighted as judged by the crows Mar could see from the Highway, but not reinhabited yet either — was their stop for the final night. If they pushed, they could hit Redcliffe at dawn, but there was no such rush, and the horses did need to rest. They handed them off to the adjoining stables and booked three rooms in the sleepy little tavern, arriving just as dinner was being served. They took a table with three hot bowls of stew and small loaves of dark bread that could’ve been mistaken for stones if soaking them in the beef stock didn’t turn them edible.

By now, Mar was more present in conversations with her friends. She learned how Ghilya had grown up in the Denerim alienage and, post Fifth Blight, crawled her way up to work at the Wonders _specifically_ to bring Julian back from Kinloch Hold. It took a few years, but once the proprietor at the time retired, she had kept enough of a correspondence with Julian to allow him to make a logical enough argument for why he should be the replacement. Like she’d said, it wasn’t that he felt any ambition or need for connection, but he still had the thought process of a father who knew that he should be there to protect his daughter. Even if he couldn’t feel the love he had, it was like he knew it was still there somewhere and operated on that alone. Sort of reminded Mar of a perpetual, total state of dissociation, except with full awareness. Not exactly a fun way to exist, but he was alive.

Lisa was completely taken with Ghilya’s story, even going so far as to express admiration for her and Julian in how well they were able to hide from the Templars. Ghilya, for her part, was growing more at ease with this new side of Lisa, a rebellious side she hadn’t shown before. And while Mar wanted to listen to Lisa’s own stories about some of the Tranquil mages she’d known as the subject turned to Tranquility in general, her attention was again stolen away, but not by her own mind this time. The town was small, the tavern even smaller, but being near the Highway granted it diverse travelers as patrons. As such, news traveled with them, and a conversation at a table somewhere behind them speared itself into Mar’s line of attention at the mere mention of—

“—at the Temple of Sacred Ashes, on First Day.”

“So soon? That’s barely half a year from now!”

 _“Ouais._ The Divine would have given more notice, but we’re all eager to see an end to this silly war. The armistice isn’t supposed to be in effect until early Haring, unfortunately. _C’est la vie, non?”_

For all appearances, Mar was paying attention to her friends' explanations of their theories on Tranquility — something she wasn’t really supposed to grasp, anyways — but her mind was fully captured by this new discussion.

The Conclave had been announced on All Souls’ Day in Val Royeaux. Ravens went out the same day, and word was spreading much faster than Mar thought would’ve been possible without fiber optics and wireless communication. But this world had magic, so fuck technology.

And now there was a date set. First Day of 9:41 Dragon. Mar had like five months to figure out what to do about it, if anything. The _last_ thing she wanted was to become this universe's Herald, which, with her luck, was exactly what was gonna happen. But that didn’t mean she wouldn’t do everything she could to ensure otherwise. Fact of the matter was that the role of Herald, which eventually meant Inquisitor, was well above her pay-grade and limit for scrutinization. She wondered if there was any way for her to stop the Breach before it happened. What kind of catastrophic effect would that incur on this universe?

As it happened, she barely needed to try for her mere existence to change things. It was one thing to redirect the paths of two unmentioned people and one mentioned person. Another to drastically alter the very course of reality. Letting the Divine help broker peace sounded like a more positive branch of a new timeline than having her die in a giant explosion and reigniting the war with fresh blame-game ammo on both sides. But how did she know that’d lead to an ultimately more peaceful timeline? Would that instead just worsen problems down the line that would’ve otherwise been resolved if the Inquisition had been allowed to reform? Maybe they’d get resolved anyways. It was hard not knowing _literally_ everything. She had no idea how anything actually went down after _Trespasser._ Surely it all would turn out okay in the end, but okay for whom? She needed to prioritize. The fate of the world, or the fate of Solas and the Ancient Elves? Unless both could be saved, but she had nowhere near enough information to even start thinking of that.

If she could find Solas, perhaps there was a way to convince him to not give his orb to Corypheus. It was already a bad enough idea on paper to not really need to try hard to point out how poorly it was bound to go. Was he already set on that course of action? Had he already done it, or did she have time? He surely wouldn’t have thought of that prior to the Conclave being announced. How could she possibly do that without showing her hand? How could she give advice on something she wasn’t supposed to know about?

Maybe he’d ask for advice without showing his own hand. It _was_ a desperate decision made by a desperate man. What would make him trust her to a high enough degree to seek guidance, but not high enough to stick a “Hello! My Name Is Fen’Harel and Now That I Know That You Know, You Must Die” sticker on his shirt?

She could just get him plastered. How much alcohol could a powerful Ancient Elvhen mage tolerate before spilling the entire can of beans? A keg of strong ale here, a couple glasses of brandy there, introduce him to the concept of taking shots…

No, that didn’t sound ethical. If she was caught trying to manipulate him into trusting her, there was zero percent chance of him actually trusting her. Again, he was hurt. Hurting him further would be counterintuitive. She wanted him to trust her by choice. Anything less would spell disaster. She didn’t believe in her deceptive abilities enough to think she could out-manipulate someone who was able to trick not just one but _two_ inconceivably powerful groups into being sealed away forever. It was better if she didn’t play that game, and instead maybe she could just be herself, keep her shoulder offered to lean on, and maybe eventually he’d…

She realized a moment too late that she was being asked a question. “Sorry, what? I completely spaced out.”

“Someone’s tired,” Lisa said, patting her on the back. “Why don’t you turn in? We don’t need to head out early tomorrow, but I’d like to get to Redcliffe before sundown.”

Mar agreed, bringing her spoon and bowl to the dirty dish bin. She was glad to see tiny, familiar concepts like that in this place. Wood or copper was a common alternative to synthetic material like plastic, but some things were uncannily exact functional equivalents.

She shucked her clothes and crawled under the linens. So far, she hadn’t gotten bedbugs or anything. The average establishment had an average level of cleanliness. People understood that hygiene was a thing, so she’d had good access to soap or vinegar to disinfect the places where she lived and worked. If she were going to assume that her body, the one she was occupying right now — again, bodysnatcher thing? Yes, no? Jury was still out, for all she knew, — retained the immunities that she’d developed over the course of her life? She wasn’t going to get terribly sick _._ In fact, she’d be more worried that whatever diseases she was unknowingly carrying would infect and literally decimate this world’s population. She wasn’t getting sick, and no one around her was dropping dead, so… Whatever the case, at least nothing weird had happened yet.

The very edges of the sky outside the tiny window in the second-floor room were still light blue, but darkness was falling quickly. Mar lit a candle to continue scrawling chicken-scratch in her journal until she was satisfied. With so much complimentary wax left to burn, she reached into her pack and pulled out one of the books she’d bought in Denerim.

Ines Arancia was a name she vaguely recognized from the various codex entries she’d stumbled onto during her rabbit-hole spirals. Mar spotted her name on a book about mushrooms and found _The Botanical Compendium_ on the same shelf. She bought them among a stack of maybe three other books after her first paycheck. It wasn’t like she had rent or student debt. She could spend all her money on books as long as she saved enough for food, too — although even that was sometimes taken care of by sneaking meals from the kitchen at Julia’s. And carrying around the extra weight helped her build body strength. She could always think of good reasons if she _really_ wanted to justify buying something she used to think might be “frivolous.”

Money was the least of her worries here. That, at least, was a good feeling.

Even after reading a somewhat dry tome on the schools of magic, made only tolerable by the fact that it was _nonfiction,_ relaxation evaded her. She snuffed the candle with a final half hour or so of wax left. Trying to get to sleep was like being seven years old again and wondering for the first time if Santa was gonna come tonight. She wondered if she’d dream tonight and couldn’t stop thinking long enough to actually go to sleep.

Eventually, though, with the steadfast resolve to keep her eyes closed, her grip on consciousness loosened as she succumbed to the natural wander of her thoughts.

* * *

Green grass so thick and lush, it was almost enough to obscure the head of flaming red hair lying beside the large oak tree.

A hand on her shoulder. When Mar looked over, there was Alistair. She felt the tears come and made no move to hide them.

“I know,” he said, voice somber. “It’s senseless, this kind of loss. It’s one thing to _know_ that someone didn’t make it, another to… see it.”

“How are we going to tell him?” Mar croaked. She thought of the boy on the bridge whose hair was the same, bright shade as the one motionless in the flora. “Who’s going to take care of him?”

“Hey,” Alistair said, turning her by the shoulders towards him as her gaze threatened to drift back towards the body. “We need to stay focused. We can’t save everyone. That’s not our job.”

“Isn’t it?” she snapped. Then, quickly softened. “I’m sorry. But if not us, then who?”

“I don’t know.” He went to retrieve the keepsake mentioned on the chanter’s board — a filigree ring made of copper. He came back and folded it in Mar’s hand. “But we’ll do what we can. He at least deserves to know she’s not coming back.”

“Are we quite finished?” a sharp voice came. _“Both_ of you are the sensitive type, I understand, but our time is limited, mind you.”

Alistair’s glare was much more sour than Mar’s as they turned to the Witch of the Wilds that had tagged along at the behest of her mother. “We’re aware, Morrigan. Thank you for the reminder of doom at our heels, it _really_ helps.”

“My pleasure,” she said, voice saccharine in the only way it knew how to be: sarcastically. “Honestly, it’s as if you’ve never seen a corpse ‘til now. Tell me, how _did_ you two reach the top of the Tower of Ishal with your eyes closed the whole way?”

“Mostly luck, of course.” Mar held Morrigan’s gaze, odd yellow eyes trance-inducing. Maybe it was the face paint that emphasized them so. “I’d make you tell the boy his mother’s dead if I weren’t certain you’d _actually_ take pleasure from making a child cry.”

Morrigan crossed her arms, frown deepening. “Do not think me so heartless. My pleasure wouldn’t lie in his tears, but in the knowledge that he’ll grow from this hardship. There is nothing to be gained from shielding him any further from the truth.”

“Great, so it’s decided,” Alistair announced, stepping away from the tree. “You’re the one who’s telling him, then.”

“No, I’ll do it.” Mar sighed, then moved to lead them back into Lothering proper. “It’s a hardship I’m sure I’ll find pleasure in growing from.”

A rare smile was heard in Morrigan’s voice. “How wise of you, Warden.”

Mar snorted. “Only because—”

Wait, she wasn’t a Warden.

She stopped. The others kept walking without her.

Oh fuck wait shit wait this was a—

In an instant, everything collapsed around her like a Hollywood set.

It didn’t look like the green swirling mists portrayed in the game, but Mar was certain this was the Fade. Or somewhere like it. A vast expanse of featureless, rocky ground extended into foggy nothingness.

She reached out. Movements stuttered visually like a glitch, after images burnt into the air, but she was certain she was in motion. She turned in place. The scenery remained unchanged all around her.

Above her, she heard whispering voices. She looked up. Far beyond her reach was a black speck in the middle of the blank sky. The longer her head remained tilted upward, the less grounded she felt — oh, she literally wasn’t on the ground. She was sure her feet had been touching a surface. They weren’t anymore.

The speck grew larger, turned into a shape, the form of a skyline, a city built like a mountain, spires and towers, made of the Void itself, it seemed. How was it still growing closer? How was she unable to look away?

She was being _pulled towards_ it. At this realization, she began to struggle, which only served to hasten her pace. The whispers told her to stop, to relax, to let go.

She couldn’t wake up. Why couldn’t she wake up?

A warmth enveloped her right hand. When she looked down, a hand made of silver light was holding it.

 _“No. You need to remember first,”_ a voice spoke in Elvhen. It came through garbled, obscured by static, but the meaning was clear.

When she looked up, her feet were back on the ground. Her hand was being held by a figure in front of her. As featureless as the environment, the figure was made entirely of silver light, pulsing softly, warm and comforting.

 _“Remember what?”_ she replied.

She got the sense that, if the figure had a face, they’d be smiling.

_“Everything.”_

* * *

Again, Mar awoke covered in sweat. If this was gonna keep happening, she should probably invest in a towel or two.

Before even changing clothes, she opened her journal and began writing.

…The fuck was THAT now? Did she just see _the_ Black City? Was that a spirit? They felt so familiar. She swore, she could still feel the warmth in her—

She dropped her charcoal pencil and examined her right palm. The tenderness had long since faded, but the same spot she had been burnt was the same spot the spirit had held. Was it her brain remembering the sensation and sneaking it into her dreams?

Dreams weren’t what they were on Earth, though. It wasn’t just her recharging mind conjuring a hallucinogenic show pieced together from various waking experiences. Well, it technically _could_ still be that, but there was something else, too. Something distinctly otherworldly.

Mar slipped out of bed and stripped the sheets herself. It was close enough to dawn to see grey light paint the hills outside. As she pulled on her last clean tunic and pair of leggings, looking forward to doing laundry first thing in Redcliffe, her eyes fell on her bow leaning next to the door. She picked it up and sat on the bare mattress, examining it yet again.

Nothing about it was particularly remarkable. Aside from the blue orb inside the grip, she supposed. Mar recalled how Lanaya had examined the little bauble specifically, but didn’t seem to find anything unusual.

Lanaya.

She can tell Lanaya about the red lyrium in Denerim.

She was her _agent._ She was _supposed_ to pass on worthwhile knowledge to her, and Mar would consider a corrupt lyrium source for one of the last concentrated populations of Templars in Thedas _worthwhile._ It had nothing to do with Solas, but Lanaya didn’t ask for information specific to any one topic — just worthwhile stuff. This counted, for sure.

She grabbed a piece of loose parchment and began to write down her account of what happened, her observations. Red lyrium was mentioned in _The Champion’s Tale,_ so it wasn’t really a stretch to suggest what the red glow in the Knight-Commander’s eyes might’ve meant. When they arrived at Redcliffe, she’d have to visit the… post office? Was a rookery the equivalent of a post office here? She’d ask Lisa about it later.

But that wasn’t the only correspondence she needed to keep. The image of Alistair’s face — how did she not realize how young he looked in the dream? — flashed through her head, both the younger, concerned, affectionate one and the older, hardened, guarded one. Whatever he had to tell her, she needed to listen. If there was any way she could help him cope with whatever her existence had resulted in, she wanted to do so.

With an unceremonious breaking of the seal, Mar opened the letter from Alistair.

> _I had a dream about a month ago that the Hero of Ferelden attended the All Souls’ Day ceremony, and when I tried to find her afterwards, she’d fled the city. I thought it was symbolic, but now I see that it was prophetic._
> 
> _Nobody knows about this._
> 
> _Nobody but you, now._
> 
> _Tell me what it means._

Mar stared at the vellum. Beneath was an address, one she suspected belonged to his messenger that expected her reply. But there was nothing else.

She knew he was telling the truth.

He trusted her.

She grabbed another piece of loose parchment and penciled a much, much shorter letter than the one to Lanaya.

> _Your guess is as good as mine._
> 
> _I woke up in a room in some old ruins, also about a month ago, deep in the Korcari Wilds. Before that, I have no memory of living on Thedas._
> 
> _Nobody knows about that._
> 
> _Nobody but you, now._
> 
> _Tell me what_ that _means._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading! give me your thoughts like the desperate animal, foaming and erratic, that i am


	11. It's Hard for Thee to Kick Against the Pricks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar, Ghilya, and Lisa arrive at Redcliffe and make themselves useful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> updated some tags! i'm hammering this thing out as a malleable form, so bear with me if you see any minor changes in prior chapters. you're not crazy, i'm just squishing this thing into one very big sloppy piece of work and having SO much fun getting my hands messy /not sarcasm
> 
> i spent so long editing this chapter that i wrote a bit of the next one, which should be out sooner rather than later! i'm not entirely happy with it, still figuring a couple details out, but i really do just want to churn it out and keep progressing the goddamn story. I wish all Overambitious Fic Writers a very Fix It In Post

When Mar drove across the country with her roommate, Kacie, she remembered being blown away by the topography that had been hidden from her for her entire life thus far. Mar grew up a sheltered nobody in a heavily blue-collar suburban town, the name of which she always has to spell out when people ask where she was from because it’s illegal for things to be pronounced the way they’re spelled in Massachusetts. There also wasn’t much in the way of natural scenery unless you went a little north or west. Her horizons had considerable room to expand. That roadtrip did a lot for her; showcasing the diverse, beautiful landscapes of the continent was just one of the major points.

The same sense of awe struck her as they rambled through the eastern Arling of Redcliffe. Verdant hillsides marked with patches of scorched earth rolled out before them like a raging grassy ocean. The Frostback Mountains rose up in the background, distant and atmospherically fogged out. The three of them walked underneath sunstreams breaking through boughs of ash and cedar, passing by empty houses with broken doors and empty pens.

Lisa and Ghilya kept their heads up, on guard for any attackers, but whatever had kept danger away so far seemed to be doing the job. Was it luck, or the fact that all three of them were armed and carrying nothing worth the trouble of stealing? Probably a combination, one that Mar was grateful for. Her mind stayed firmly in the realm of “What is dreams?” and “Conclave soon, what do?” Rumination was one of her worst habits, but she lacked most of her usual coping mechanisms. Foxglove threw little fits when she got too distracted from focusing on riding, so constant thinking was all she could do. At least it staved off boredom and made time pass faster, something as stressful as it was relieving.

Not long after lunching on horseback — a less challenging activity to do while riding — they hit the turnoff for Redcliffe Road. The Crossroads of the Hinterlands would’ve been a ways down the Highway, according to the signpost at the fork.

“It’s a hotbed for the fighting,” Lisa commented as they continued towards the village. “Templars will see a staff and pounce, and I’ve seen mages who believe their best offense is a good defense. Glad we’re not going that way.”

“Agreed,” said Ghilya. “I had good reasons for staying in a city still occupied by Templars — at least I had four walls and a roof, access to an array of magical items.” She looked to Mar. “I’ve been meaning to ask you about that bow, Mar. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Me neither. I wish I’d known its previous owner better.” Technically wasn’t a lie. She’d claimed it’d belonged to one of the hired mercenaries on the fabled expedition she’d supposedly gone on with Solas, the supposed elven scholar. It had to have belonged to _someone,_ right? Someone put that little ball of glass in the grip — Mar thought it was an awkward spot for it, but it had to have been done on purpose. She wasn’t ready to try and figure out how that glowy trick worked. All she’d done was shoot it like normal. It certainly hadn’t happened again since. It was clearly a powerful magical item, and she’d brushed it off as some merc’s weapon she’d found just _laying_ around in a swamp, abandoned.

Mar already sort of regretted lying. It worked in a pinch, but she didn’t know she’d have to keep it up for this long. Back at Ostagar, she imagined going off on her own and never needing to refer to Solas as a scholar or to the bow as a lowly merc’s weapon. It was still unlikely that they’d just _run into_ Solas — what was he even doing right now? Gathering agents? Snoozing in ruins? — but she knew she needed to prepare. All she could picture was Lisa or Ghilya getting to him first and then she’d need to explain how she knew his name and face without ever having met him.

Her lips twitched into a smile just thinking of pulling a “I dreamed of you in the Fade once” on the guy who _made_ the Fade. He could reuse that one however many times he needed to — he’s a Fade mage. Half his life was spent asleep, probably. As far as anyone knew, she was just a wayward elf with a resemblance, as uncanny as it was unlikely, to a capital-H Hero.

It was kind of great that _that_ was the most intriguing thing about her, though. Who would think that she’s straight up from another universe that foretold future events when she already had “Celebrity Lookalike” under her belt? It could make a good distraction. _Yes, please investigate this eerie coincidence, pay no attention to how quickly I connected the dots of Templars to red lyrium._

Give up a minor lie to protect the bigger lie. If her two companions figured out there was never any expedition, she’d tell them the partial truth instead. Ideally, she’d have more truth of the matter figured out by then, but the less she could honestly claim she knew, the better.

Mar kept her hood up as they approached the village of Redcliffe. She wasn’t sure how fast news had traveled about her unexpected impersonator gig. She’d rather not know. They crossed over a stone arched bridge as the village came into view, awash in the afternoon sunlight cascading above the bay. The sound of waves crashing to shore provided base noise for typical urban commotion floating through the air. Appropriately, cliffs of red rock lined the village, dotted with surly houses and sheds, cut by waterfalls and rivers cascading towards the lake. Docks leadened with boats and ships of small to moderate sizes staked their claims as far into the blue as they dared, many vessels already unleashed and bobbing around. Further ahead, the imposing structure of Redcliffe Castle greeted them, slate grey and decorated with banners, a long bridge connecting it to somewhere beyond the cliffs they descended.

“I’ve had my eyes and ears on news out of Redcliffe for a bit now,” Ghilya said as they formed a single file line due to denser crowds. “More and more mages come here each day, mostly Libertarians and Isolationists. Resolutionists, too, of course.”

Mar paid… _some_ attention to the structures within the Circle and the Templar. The Fraternities weren’t a huge area of focus, and she _had_ read Asunder… Once. And it’d been a while.

“Is there a Fraternity you’d consider yourself most aligned with?” Lisa asked. Of course she’d have a firmer working knowledge with her background.

Her answer was near immediate, informed by many prior thoughts on the matter. “Libertarians. I think the ideals of the Aequitarians are valid, and I can understand the Isolationists wanting to be left well enough alone, but uniting together is the most powerful way to ensure fair treatment of mages long after we’re all gone.” A beat of silence. “And fuck the Lucrosians.”

They started in on some lively conversation that gave Mar plenty of insight into the whole mechanics of it, along with popular opinion around here. No, they didn’t _condone_ the actions of one apostate in 9:37 Dragon at the Chantry in Kirkwall, but they couldn’t disagree that the rebellion accomplished what he’d set out for it to accomplish — unrest that sparked a conversation that’d been demanding to be had since the Circles were established. Lisa’s life with former Templar training and living in that environment shed an invaluable light on how the culture there reinforces that “keeping mages in line” was “the will of the Maker.”

Ghilya laughed at that as they approached the local stables. “If anyone claims to know the will of the Maker, they most certainly do not.”

Donating horses stolen from the Templar Order seemed like a good tribute to pay towards the rebel mages, so they said goodbye to the three mounts that served them so well and headed off into the village proper. The square featured a stone griffon monument, complete with a steel plaque in remembrance of the Hero of Fereldan and others K.I.A. of the Fifth Blight. Mages and villagers bustled to and fro while the three of them grabbed sandwiches at one of the food stalls lining the edges, settling onto a bench to discuss the next step.

Ghilya mentioned that she partially chose Redcliffe in hopes of finding a mage to apprentice. Her power was considerable, but all of her training focused on expelling it as much of it as quickly as possible. If she were going to live her life as an out-and-about mage, she would need to learn how to budget her mana more efficiently, or she’d end up needing enough lyrium potions to rehabilitate a long-dry Templar.

Lisa nodded, swallowing a bite of her thick-cut brisket sandwich. “That’s a very good idea. I’ve been trying to think of ways to aid the rebellion… If I weren’t a fifth child, I might be able to offer noble connections.”

“You could ask someone in charge about it,” Ghilya said, shrugging and going for another bite of her chicken-and-greens. “What about you, Mar? Got any plans?”

She appreciated her friends’ insistence to keep her in the conversation, even when her mind was too frazzled to get fully into it. “Busking and tavern work, honestly. Any idea where I can get in touch with Julia? I’m gonna need a good reference.”

* * *

After visiting the local mail post and placing her three letters to be sent in the morning by raven — pricier than by horse, but she could afford the speedy delivery she needed — Mar decided that hitting up the taverns was her best bet for a place to shack up for the night and/or work in. (Also, booze.) It came so easily in Denerim, even just by chance, that she figured it wouldn’t be too hard here. Lisa and Ghilya went off together towards the Chantry, both meaning to speak to some sort of authority figure, while Mar made her rounds.

There were far fewer establishments in Redcliffe, so it didn’t take long for Mar to exhaust her options. Out of the three taverns, only one was hiring for a barback position: _The Pigeonhole._ She snorted a little at the name, but the owner, Lucinda, was nice enough to let her start as a maid with her own tiny servant’s quarters, much like her room in Denerim, for as long as it took Julia to vouch for her barback prowess.

Mar liked when she was able to clean everything herself. It wasn’t that good hygiene was unheard of in Thedas, but being able to make sure enough vinegar went into the floor cleaning solution to kill bacteria gave her a peace of mind she didn’t trust a population ignorant to germ theory to be able to give. TB _was_ a thing here. There was a lute player in the corner accompanying the general lowkey vibe of the Pigeonhole — not nearly as crowded as _The Gull & Lantern_ or _La Bella,_ but from the suspicious looks of _who’s the new elf?_ a robust supply of loyal regulars.

After riding all day, Mar was surprised at how much energy she was able to put in that first night. She became acquainted with her coworkers — one bartender, two servers, and one barback on shift — and even Lucinda offered light praise at her enthusiasm.

“Just happy to have made it here in one piece.” Mar smiled as she cleared off empty tankards and wiped down the bar with a rag soaked in the vinegar solution. Emotional labor was such a familiar skill on her part that it barely registered as practiced anymore.

There turned out to be a basic form of indoor plumbing in Redcliffe, no doubt utilizing the natural water flow of the rivers, so after finishing the arduous task of cleaning the loo, Mar ran out of things to clean, which more or less marked the end of the shift. Just as she sat down with a pint of ale, chatting with the only other elven employee, Lisa walked in the front door. Midsip, Mar waved her over and bought another ale.

“Levi,” Mar said to the bartender as he poured the tap. “This is Lisa, one of the companions I travelled here with.”

“Charmed,” Levi responded, placing the tankard in front of her with a smile as professional as Mar’s. He tossed the bit of dark hair covering his eye back, propping his elbows on the bar and resting his chin upon bridged fingers. “So you’re the rogue Templar, yeah?”

“That’s me,” she said after a healthy swig. Her hair fell in a long braid over her shoulder, each plait shining in the lamplight.

“Takes guts to walk right into a town full of mages,” he said, standing to return to cleaning cups. “You’re aware there’s a war going on? One that you’re fresh from the other side of?”

Lisa laughed a little. “That’s exactly why I’m here, to help end this mess. I just signed up to train mages to fight against Templar abilities, actually.”

Mar raised her tankard, saluting her. “Much more direct than any futzy noble connections your birth order robbed you of.”

“Ooo,” Levi drawled, worrying a clean rag on a mug. “Miss Lady over here! What family are you from? Some important second cousin’s step-brother’s uncle-in-law’s poodle-sitter?”

Her face tinged pink across her nose and cheeks. “Sort of, I suppose. I’m a de Montfort.”

The name tickled something in the recesses of Mar’s lore library. Apparently, even an elven bartender in Ferelden knew who the de Montforts were off the top of their head, because Levi stopped his mug-handling and settled her with an intensely skeptical look. “How far removed from Her Majesty are we talking?”

Lisa’s face only grew pinker. “Second cousin. But like I said, fifth child in line, who’s long forsaken titles or claims.”

“Ooooohh,” Mar finally let out. _“That’s_ where I know that name.” Then, after a moment, fixed Lisa with a stare. “You’re second cousins with the Empress of Fire and you _don’t_ tell every living soul you meet? That’s so cool!”

“It’s dangerous, is what it is,” she bit, flustered more than angry. “I’d much prefer if the topic were dropped, seeing that it’s irrelevant to all of our lives.”

Levi just shrugged and went back to his mug. “You meet all kinds of folk in this line of work, new guy.” His lips spread into a thin line of sympathy for Mar. “Hope you’re ready.”

They remained at the bar after close, well into the witching hours of the night. Lisa left with a hug, returning to where she and Ghilya found lodging in the Chantry. Mar retired to the closet she now called her room. She undressed and reclined on the thin linens, blessedly pest-free, diving into her journal.

Tomorrow, she’d find a bath, launder her wardrobe, and busk a little before working again. Routine was another thing that kept her mental health from spiraling. It’d taken a fucking _lot_ to become as stable as she was… or, at least _had been_ before waking up in this impossible universe. Clearly, it wasn’t impossible, but she was still having a hard time believing this wasn’t just one long fever dream while she remained comatose or something. It was real enough, she supposed, which was what she operated on, but the doubt still lingered.

It always did.

* * *

Julia’s reply came four days later, right through the mail slot in her room. She’d registered her address at the mail post, seeing that she was expecting mail, and presented proof of competent barmanship to Lucinda.

That got her hired as a pre-dusk barback, the kind that makes less in gratuity while handling an easier flow of customers. She was fine with that. Her routine was malleable enough, being able to shift her leisure hours to the mornings and late evenings. Most of her time went towards archery practice, playing her banjo, or sitting with a book in a good eavesdropping spot, for no reason in particular other than to keep an ear out for any news. Of course she was actually reading, too, whether from a newly purchased book or something borrowed from the Chantry library. She needed to be sure she had a working knowledge of Thedosian history and culture for someone proclaimed to be self-taught.

Mar also made it a point to read specifically about the Fade and dreaming, in case there was anything she missed from the games. There wasn’t much she could find about specifically dreaming of a dead person’s life. Every night, another memory of Lyna Mahariel conjured, and each time, she failed to recognize she was dreaming and not in fact the Hero of Ferelden until waking. Most memories were brief clips of her work in Redcliffe village, including moments before, during, and after the battle against the undead. Zombies On Fire dreams put a dent in Mar’s sleep quality, but anything she could glean from those little insights helped. She wasn’t actually certain that anything she dreamt reflected reality. Still, seemed worth paying attention to.

With her evenings free, she made it a habit to snag dinner with Lisa and/or Ghilya, depending on their schedules. Lisa threw herself into helping mages defend against Templar abilities, clearly ecstatic about it from how she went on about it. And while Ghilya hadn’t yet secured a dedicated tutor, she attended classes held behind the Chantry for mages of all skill levels. Turns out, when mages were left to teach each other how to control their power and resist possession, it _works._ It’s almost like you couldn’t classify an entire group of people as one thing. There were responsible mages as well as irresponsible, constructive and destructive, selfish and selfless. Like literally any group, they were individuals with characteristics unique to their person, and judging them all by the actions of a few was unfair and immoral.

SO weird.

A few weeks into the job, Mar was saying as much to Ghilya while they lounged on the base of the griffon monument chowing down on batter-fried pork-and-venison sausages on sticks. AKA corndogs, but they weren’t called that here.

 _“Seriously!”_ Ghilya exclaimed before chomping into her second sausage. “I don’t care what Tevinter did with their magic, that’s _Tevinter._ The fact that the Chantry expects us to go down the same path if mages are given freedom only speaks to how little they think of mages.”

“They’re still just bitter over the split, I bet,” Mar said. “Like, come on, it’s been a while, I think it’s time to move on and stop taking your breakup out on people who weren’t even a _part_ of it.”

Ghilya nodded dramatically while she swallowed. “Fucking _thank you!”_

Just as one couldn’t judge every mage by the actions of a few, Mar knew that judging an entire nation by the act of individuals wasn’t an entirely sound assessment — Dorian and Maevaris were prime examples of how much kinder mages were treated in the North. Not every person living in a fascist nation was happy about it, as she _well knew_ from living in America. It was one thing to pledge allegiance to your homeland and refuse to question its tenets, another to love it and desire to see it be a better homeland to everyone in it. That being said, while slavery was common everywhere in Thedas, Tevinter was unique in the fact that it _embraced it_ instead of disavowed it. She enjoyed living in a nation where at least the popular opinion of those in power frowned upon heinous violations of people’s rights.

“It pisses me off that people would think that we’d accept help from Tevinter if they offered it.” Ghilya‘s eyes were hard, turning upwards to watch the stars. “Some of my peers have been saying something like that, that we’re so hated by everyone here that the only other people who’d help are damn _Vints._ Yeah, I mean, we’re in a corner and kind of desperate, but I can’t see Grand Enchanter Fiona even _entertaining_ the notion.”

Mar drank from her waterskin while she considered her words. She’d always known that Fiona “Fuck the Divine” Dragonage acted incredibly out of character in Inquisition. She was never one to be silenced or spoken over, never one to be persuaded by slavers when she’d been a fucking _slave herself._ The games were clearly limited to some extent by programming and the writers’ misgivings. It made her faith in her “foresight” a little shaky. Was that a reason or an excuse to keep her potential knowledge of the future to herself?

“Have you met Fiona yet?” Ghilya asked, which stopped Mar’s train of thought from veering any more off track. She shook her head in response. “Neither have I. I mean, I’ve seen her in passing, but she usually looks pretty busy.”

“I can only imagine,” Mar said, reclining against the stone behind her. “The Conclave is, what, four months away now?”

Ghilya nodded. “I’d be sort of dreading that whole thing if I were her. Chances are, Divine Justinia will just tell everyone to kiss and make up and then go back to ‘normal’ even though ‘normal’ is what got us into this mess in the first place.”

“Is that the best case scenario?”

“No, best case is that she at least picks a damn side and we can go from there.”

“And worst case,” Mar hazarded, “is going right back to blowing each other up?”

She gave a quiet giggle, tossing her short locs over to one side. “Worst case is some apostate blows the whole place up. Again.”

Mar had to laugh. To Ghilya, hopefully it sounded like she was laughing at her dark humor, heehee terrorism hoohoo, and not because that was more or less what would literally happen if nobody stopped a specific apostate from “losing” his orb for the Venatori to find.

A commotion on the other side of the square caught both of their attention, then.

“If you like the Circles so much, why don’t you _marry_ them?” one voice rose up, belonging to a red-faced human mage.

The man across from him, cool and dark as a winter’s night, stood with squared shoulders. “There is no _hope_ without reinstating the Circles, you realize? The Chantry says—”

“That mages need to _earn_ freedom?” the ruddied man interrupted. A couple hoots from the peanut gallery. “That I can follow every rule and _still_ live with a sword at my throat?”

“That without the Circles’ protection, we’re _doomed,''_ came the sharp reply. Some others voiced their support. He had a way of throwing his voice to boom over the chatter of the crowd that had slowly begun to form, including Ghilya and Mar at the front. “Only chaos lies down that path! If we want a sustainable future for all magekind, we need _order,_ not some idyllic vision of freedom you keep thinking will happen.”

 _“Life_ is chaos, Hanley!” His head was a big ol’ Roma tomato by this point. “Even with order, everything fell into disorder! How can we expect to be safe when we’re not in control of our own _lives?”_

The restless crowd closed in, and Mar didn’t realize how dense it’d grown until she looked around. Ghilya joined in the cheers for Red Face, while Hanley narrowed his eyes and lifted his chin. “You think you can manage yourself better than the Maker?” He cast his gaze around the people enclosing them. “We may have magic, but you’re foolish to think we’re not still powerless. If any mage were allowed to live in a city, they’d live as a constant threat to their neighbors. Could you live with _that?_ Could you live as the one wielding the sword, in the name of freedom? Or whatever selfish perversion of the word you’d claim?”

When Red Face hesitated, Mar could see the self-satisfaction in Hanley’s eyes, backed by Loyalist jeers. With an opening in the conversation, someone else’s voice rang out.

“That’s not always true! I lived in Denerim as a mage for _years_ and _I_ never hurt anyone!”

Everyone turned to look at Mar… No, nope, they were looking at _Ghilya,_ who Mar just realized was the one who’d spoken. When Hanley shot a glare at her, she remained unfazed, stepping forward to meet the challenge. “We aren’t the mindless beasts that the Chantry fears us to be. We are _people,_ not bombs waiting to go off at a moment’s notice.”

She got some cheers, much to Hanley’s chagrin. “One anecdote is hardly enough to purport that abominations would _never_ occur.”

“I’m not saying that,” she said, eyebrows drawing a thick, hard line. “I’m saying that it isn’t _inevitable._ If we have our community, then we have _accountability_ for whenever that may happen. Nobody should be locked up for a crime they may _never_ commit, or would you see every man with a dagger behind bars?”

More cheers, more agitation. Rowdiness bubbled through the masses, calming just enough to hear Hanley’s reply. “A man with means of self-defense is not the same as—”

“As us? Who are also men with means of self-defense?” Even more whoops of support. “I’ve spent my whole life among common folk. We’re not so different from everyone else! We all laugh, sing, cry… We’re more _alike_ than not!” More cheers, as she extended a hand. “Why don’t we unite over our similarities instead of squabble over our differences?”

Hanley stepped towards her finally, a grimace cemented on his face. All went deathly silent. “We are _not_ alike.”

Ghilya just smiled at him, dimples in her cheeks carving deep shadows. “I don’t think you believe that. We both have enough passion to speak up, enough love for our siblings to want what we think is best.” She waved her hand in the air, still waiting for his response.

Mar held her breath with the rest of the onlookers. Her arm was poised to reach for her bow, not really thinking she’d be any match for several mages, but she’d already accepted that she’d die for Ghilya in a heartbeat. Even if she didn’t particularly need help defending herself.

Wordlessly, Hanley glared at the extended hand, stuck his chin up higher, and scoffed before turning and pushing his way through the crowd to leave. The energy fizzled out anticlimactically. Ghilya sighed and let her hand drop. In return, however, while most people dispersed, some stayed to keep talking with her, giving back pats and words of agreement. Mar stayed back, watching her friend, a striking black figure wrapped in powder blue robes, all but blossom in her element. Someone beside Mar asked who she was.

Mar answered, “Her name is Ghilya,” turning to smile proudly at the woman. There was only an instant between registering the deep brown eyes watching Ghilya as “soulful” and recognizing Grand Enchanter Fiona.

When Mar had read _The Calling,_ she only ever pictured Fiona as a woman of color, especially when she referenced a woman with “porcelain skin” in contrast to herself. Another misportrayal of her character in Inquisition, as her skintone much more closely resembled Mar’s, warm and softly illuminated in the surrounding torchlight. Alistair, too, gave more credence to the designer’s tendency to whitewash, an unfortunate side effect of human error and unconscious bias. It was a little funny, though, that Fiona stood a full three inches shorter than Mar, and Mar wasn’t even particularly tall.

“When did she arrive?” Fiona asked, still not taking her eyes off Ghilya.

“A month ago now.” There was something else in her gaze, a measured evaluation, not warm but not cold, either. Mar would be _damned_ if she missed a chance to gas a friend up. “She’s from Denerim, lived undercover since she came into her magic. Never met a mage more powerful, either.”

Fiona finally slid her gaze to Mar, as if noticing her for the first time. “How was she able to remain undetected for so long?”

“That,” Mar said, “is a question best answered by herself. She explained it to me once, it’s really quite fascinating.”

Her neatly coiffed black hair drifted in front of her face before she tucked it behind a thin pointed ear. “Thank you,” was all she said before making her way towards Ghilya.

Mar watched as the rest of the mages left Ghilya be once the Grand Enchanter made her presence known. Ghilya’s face brightened with surprise, and then a sort of reverence while Fiona spoke quietly to her for a minute. Then, they made for the Chantry together, Ghilya taking just a second to look back at Mar, eyes as wide as her grin, pointing a thumb at Fiona, and then turning around to follow.

As for Mar, who began carrying her archery set along with her banjo everywhere with her, she bought another corn dog and wolfed it down while tuning up and preparing for an evening of folk music from a different universe.

After about an hour, as she finished playing _The Man Comes Around_ (because who doesn’t like sprinkling just a _little_ apocalyptic soothsaying into their fun hippie music?), Ghilya reappeared, wearing a smile like a permanent installation. “Hey,” she said, taking a seat right next to Mar.

“Hey,” Mar said, grinning back. “Sooo, what’d Fiona want?”

She was wiggling back and forth with ill-contained excitement. “You’re looking at the Grand Enchanter’s brand new apprentice!”

Mar couldn’t help but let out an honest-to-Void _squeal_ and jump up to squeeze the life out of her friend. “That’s amazing! I’m so happy for you!”

Ghilya leaned back from the tight hug, still close enough that their foreheads nearly touched, and said, “And she wants me to accompany her ambassador to the Conclave!”

A punch in the gut. That would’ve been gentler, as the breath evacuated Mar’s chest. She tried to swallow as her mouth went dry, heavy pit forming in her abdomen, falling into shocked silence “That’s… Wow, that’s… huge! She’s— she’s not going herself?”

With a soft hand on her forearm, she guided them back to sitting on the bench. “I know, it _is_ sudden, but I’m a living example of a successful, free mage. I can _show_ them that mages are individuals that can be trusted as any other, even someone with a strong connection to the Fade.”

Mar felt _nauseous._ It took every ounce of strength to finally untangle the knot in her throat, force her brow muscles to relax, and summon a warm smile. Just another testament to her proficiency in emotional labor. “Watch out, Thedas, there’s a new face of Freedom for Mages!”

They embraced again, ecstatic. She hated that she could fool anyone, but she especially hated that she could fool Ghilya.

* * *

The two of them, hand in hand, hunted down Lisa after her anti-Templar training shift. They all went out for celebratory drinks at the Lantern, though for Mar’s part, it felt more like mourning.

She managed to keep a lid on the forlorn, distant gazes, for the most part. They kept the ale flowing, though Mar maintained her usual slow pace. Sad drunk was _not_ happening tonight. She was supposed to be _happy_ for such an opportunity. Sure, it was gonna be dangerous, but she wasn’t too worried. Templars were all bark, no bite — they may have split from the Chantry, but they still had their dignity. If the mages could play nice, they could too.

“What’s that town by the Temple, Haven?” Lisa said. “Isn’t that where a bunch of dragon cultists live?”

Ghilya arrived back at the table with their third round of ales, pulling herself back into the chair beside Mar. “Used to, but they’ve been gone a long time. I think Most Holy sent a forward group to prepare the village to house pilgrims. It’s a whole operation.”

Mar sipped from her tankard, trying to stay calm. Succeeding, if she might say. The usual busy tavern atmosphere — someone with a goddamn _hurdy gurdy_ was throwing it _down_ on the stage — was miraculous as drowning out ruminative thoughts. She needed to wait until she could get to her journal.

“How’s training going, ex-Temp?” Ghilya asked before tossing back half the tankard.

A line of foam clung to Lisa’s upper lip. She wiped it off with a thumb before speaking. “Good! Everyone’s showing such progress, maybe the Conclave won’t be necessary, huh?” Someone must’ve walked in, because her eyes flicked behind Mar towards the door in the middle of her sentence, face brightening as she went on. “If Templars simply lost the advantages they have…” Then, a quick wave. “Hey, you made it!”

Mar hadn’t specifically met any of Lisa’s students, now that she thought of it. Her first thought was how glad she was that she could keep at least one friend here, one who was settling in and making other friends.

She was then thankful that, although the tankard was at her lips, she hadn’t yet started drinking, because she would have choked on it as her throat _locked_ up.

“Everyone, this is Callie, from one of my classes,” Lisa introduced.

The woman held her arms close to her body, as if in a practiced stance of demurity, though the staff on her back, dark wood tipped with a solid white orb, marked her as anything but helpless. She was a slim human woman around Mar’s age, complexion fair and freckled like Lisa, but instead of the ex-Templar’s shock of red hair, Callie’s was a long, pale blond veil, two front pieces twisted around and pinned to the back, away from her face. She smiled a little as she drew closer, taking a seat on the booth next to Lisa, lifting a hand to wave at Mar and Ghilya. “Hello, it’s nice to finally make your acquaintances!” She grinned sweetly at Lisa, overbite sinking into her bottom lip, displaying the gap between the two front middle teeth that Mar knew she had.

Ghilya saved her from having to respond immediately, offering her hand in greeting. “Well met, Callie! I’m Ghilya, this is Mar.”

Mar gave a polite nod and smile, blinking the normal amount of times as Callie’s eyes met hers, flashing with an intelligent glint you could only see if you were looking for it.

She was looking for it, because she was learning that the designer’s image of Calpernia, the _leader of the Venatori,_ was true to this universe. Her in-game model did her justice well enough, although Mar thought the concept art worked as a pleasantly stylized depiction. She tried, she _really_ tried to avoid staring, but… well…

She was also just. So _pretty._

Was every person in Tevinter also just extremely gorgeous by default? It was a specifically curated form of prettiness, one that emphasized innocence and trustworthiness. Her body language remained open, honest, in a way that Mar knew was a front for _many_ secrets. She couldn’t tell if it was apparent to anyone who didn’t already know. Maybe it was, but who would look at a face like _that_ and pin her for _in cahoots with a powerful Tevinter supremacist cult?_

If she wouldn’t stop staring because a real-life version of a fictional antagonist was sitting across the table from her, she resolved to stop just so that Calpernia— _Callie_ wouldn’t catch her shamelessly just… checking her the fuck _out._

Shit, she _did_ have a thing for villains.

Shit, she was still _staring._

She suddenly remembered she had a quarter-full tankard, downed it, and then stood and picked up the tray to fetch the next round. “Ale’s fine by you, Callie?” A mistake was made, then, when she glanced up and caught her profile, a sharp nose and sharper cheekbones, a defined browline and hawkish eyes, catching the glow of the lantern on the other side. Then, she craned her elegant neck to look at her, lips forming a saccharine smile. The gap in her teeth screamed at Mar, both as a mark of identification and as a trait that she’d always thought was incredibly attractive.

“An Antivan red—” she said, holding Mar’s eyes as she placed a silver right on the tray, “—a bottle of it, would do me better.”

_Shit she could totally tell that she’d been staring._

It was embarrassingly easy for a flustered smile to find its way onto Mar’s face before she had time to turn away and scuttle to the bar, taking deep breaths in a desperately inconspicuous manner. She did _not_ look back to see if Calpernia was watching.

 _God. FUCK me… but also_ fuck _me. Fuck. Fuck… fuck? Yeah, Fuck._

_I’m fucked._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [jazz hands in Big Gay]


	12. Closer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mar experiences Gay Thots™ and Existential Thots™

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sits down and comes to term with the fact that this is now Novella Length and we still haven’t gotten to Breach Time. i think i just like reading what happens outside of the storyline of the games tbh
> 
> award for fastest update goes to me! this is an outlier and should not be taken as a regular update pattern. this chapter is 7100 words on the DOT but there was no good place to break it up into two. a lot of things happen bc this story needs to keep moving. so thank you in advance for enjoying long chapters!

It felt _much_ longer than the half hour it took for Mar to finally retire to her closet-room. She shivered as she told Callie it was nice to meet her, hanging onto the coy smile and spark in her eyes as she departed. Almost regretfully, but not quite.

She all but belly-flopped onto her mattress, pressed charcoal pencil to paper before even settling. Her mind was positively _reeling_ with this new presence put into play. Her right hand flew through each page, tearing a vicious flaming streak in its chicken-scratch wake.

Her head could only go _CALPERNIA???_ the tune of _BEYONCÉ???_ What was she _doing_ here? If she were honest with herself, she _had_ been expecting Venatori spies to show up eventually, if they hadn’t already. There didn’t seem to be a reliable way to tell a Vint and a Southerner apart. Calpernia had a Marcher accent, disguising whatever a Tevinter one may sound like.

If Mar had to guess, she was here as a spy to infiltrate the mage rebellion and sow seeds of misplaced trust in the Imperium. They’d stayed away from the topic tonight, but it’d be interesting to hear what she had to say about it.

Mar doubted she really was the only Tevinter mage here. Ghilya’d mentioned that people had already started whispers of a hypothetical alliance, but Mar couldn’t pin down whether it was in good or bad faith. That the infiltration may have begun this early was a little surprising, but altogether not uncalled for.

Shit. What could she do? Without evidence, she didn’t feel confident in calling Calpernia out. Lisa and Ghilya both liked her. They didn’t have a _clue_ or even so much as a gut feeling about her. Was she just that charismatic?

A gap-toothed grin flashed in her head, a pair of smiling eyes twinkling in the lamplight. Her cheeks went hot, tingling. Yes, she _was_ that charismatic. If Mar didn’t know better, she’d fall for it, too.

But she _did_ know better. Better than anyone, arguably. And she _still_ might fall for… something.

Steam blown sufficiently off, she snapped the journal shut and returned it to its home under her mattress. Her head rested comfortably atop her pillow, her scratchy blanket pulled to her chin as she curled into a ball.

Her mind churned through her options, ceaseless even as she eventually drifted off to sleep.

* * *

She woke from a dream she hadn’t had before — Mahariel had flirted _hardcore_ with Bann Teagan when her group first arrived. From what she could tell, it wasn’t done with any further intentions on Lyna’s part. In fact, as she was dreaming, feeling exactly what she must’ve felt, it was purely part of the Hero’s sense of humor. _Yes, I’ll help prepare the town to defend themselves against the literal undead, but don’t worry, I’ll_ make _time to shamelessly flirt with you, random human noble._

Lyna Mahariel wasn’t one to throw _shem_ around at every human she met. From what Mar witnessed in each dream, she’d never felt that different from humans, reluctant to see them as a separate entity. There was a feeling of rebellion in it, the refusal to cement elf-human relations as Us vs. Them. Mar believed they shared that brand of wisdom.

She was growing more and more certain that what she was experiencing really was _exactly_ what Lyna Mahariel had experienced. It was distinctly sponge-like, the way she soaked each dream up, feeling and thinking just as she did. And just as suspected, everything was attached to the environment she slept in. It made her wonder what she’d find in other places. If she could nap in Redcliffe Castle, too far out of range to tap into the Fade from the village, would she discover why she’d chosen to sacrifice herself? Was there a way to tune into a specific memory, like that particular conversation she must’ve had with Morrigan? There were plenty of reasons to decline the ritual, Mar imagined, but to definitively _know_ what Lyna Mahariel had thought, felt, and experienced in the last few days of her life…

She groaned, sitting up, just as two letters slid under her door. Mar rubbed crusties from her eyes, swinging her feet to meet the floor and swiftly retrieve the envelopes. One was addressed for “ _Mar,”_ a round white petal sealed into the wax, while the other was blank with the same oak tree seal as Alistair’s last letter. It wasn’t like Mar had many correspondences to keep, but it was about time she got responses.

She opened the letter from Lanaya first. It was a simple missive, thanking her for sharing information, three silver tumbling out of the envelope. Oh, hell yeah, spy work _pays!_ She could get a nice, soft blanket and food for a couple weeks with this. Or some really nice bourbon. She missed gin dearly, but the only clear liquor she’d seen so far was a type of vodka. Too many bad nights with vodka plagued her, so brown it was.

Her nerves nestled in her throat as she opened the letter from King Alistair, finding a longer missive than his last. In short, he was interested in hearing more about the ruin she woke up in, in any connection she might have to Mahariel, in who she herself was as a person.

He also made note that the Knight-Commander had been found dead in the Alienage, shot in the eye, near the gates to the docks. The same gates he’d envisioned Lyna escaping through, the ones he’d sent Jerim to deliver her the first letter. The Order was in disarray, unignorable numbers of deserters growing every day.

_Lyna could be ruthless, at times,_ he wrote. _It was her life or someone else’s, and she operated on that, even at the end._

Mar’s heart filled with an unnameable ache as she continued reading. He mentioned that they’d gotten into an argument after the Landsmeet, and he’d refused her request to speak again before the Battle of Denerim. She’d wanted to say goodbye, he said, and he’d denied them both that.

_Naïveté and stubborn resentment,_ the letter went on, _gave me my first hard lesson as a monarch — to never let egocentric feelings of pain get in the way. If only she could see how I’ve grown since then, how much I wish I’d acted differently. I’d forgotten my love for her in favor of a childish lack of responsibility, to her, to our friendship, to myself. I’m rambling now. It’s a habit I’ve yet to break._

_Will you be in Redcliffe for Satinalia? I plan to attend the Arl’s feast at the castle with my uncle. It’s not often open to the public. I would very much like to meet with you, and I promise, I will handle myself better than when we saw each other last._

_And thank you. For trusting me, without reason to._

Her eyes pooled with tears that came and fell onto the vellum, unbidden. If ink could contain emotion, she’d swear she _felt_ it, saturating her skin and seeping into her pores.

Bits of memory crawled to the surface, ones she’d seen in her dreams. The looks Alistair had given Lyna, the gentleness she used with him, the dialogues that Mar _knew_ influenced his romance flag. Was there a memory of some confession that she’d simply not yet uncovered? Would she ever be anywhere near where it’d happened, if it did?

Fuck, there were _so_ many playthroughs where she’d triggered him to initiate the romance completely on accident. She apologized to the TV screen every time she had to refuse him. Her favorite character to romance was Zevran (damn straight-locked Morrigan without mods, _absolute_ bullshit), and oftentimes she was already bedroll-deep when Alistair came to her Warden, presenting the rose he picked in Lothering. It broke her heart to break his, but she couldn’t help showing him the kind of love and acceptance it took to get to that point.

She couldn’t say for sure if that was the case in this universe, but knowing him, he must’ve held some form of high respect and affection for her. The question was how Lyna felt, and what they’d gotten into a fight over. Did she love him back, but still chose to sacrifice herself? If she knew the exact outcome of the Landsmeet, she could make another pretty good guess. If Loghain was still alive…

A knock on her door startled her. She threw the missives inside her journal before answering, finding Lisa on the other side.

“You’re up early,” Mar said, cinching the belt around her tunic.

“Thought you’d like to grab breakfast together.” She smiled, crossing her arms. “You have the day free, no?” When Mar nodded, she continued, “You should come to my class! I’d love to show you how far the mages have come in their training.”

Mar paused, considering, and then Lisa added in a singsong voice with a wiggle of her brow, “Callie will be theeere!”

She just laughed, feeling a blush creep up her neck for myriad reasons. “That obvious, huh?”

“I wouldn’t have blinked,” she said, smiling wide, “if the table between you two combusted last night. _Allons-y, tu lesbienne inutile.”_

* * *

It was, frankly, horrifying to watch Lisa teach a Tevinter spy how to counteract the most effective weapon her friend could defend herself with.

Mar wasn’t sure how long she’d been staring at Callie’s lithe form sweep and swirl around the ex-Templar, double-countering the counter magic hurled at her. It was ingenious, giving mages an edge against the techniques that threatened them so completely. She supposed every mage should know how to do so, but a spy working as an accomplice to unknowingly enslave other mages? Maybe withhold this sort of knowledge.

As if anyone suspected Callie. She laughed with the other students, her sweet demeanor emanating harmlessness. Did she truly believe she was doing the right thing, that Corypheus would help her rebuild Tevinter, free of slavery and corruption? That he was above just straight up lying to her face, telling himself that she’d “forgive him in time” or whatever?

Mar loved the character of Calpernia, enough to read her short story but not enough to side with the Templars in Champions of the Just more often. It sucked because that quest was so much more _fun_ than the rebel mage’s In Hushed Whispers, in her opinion. She loved Samson too, don’t get her wrong, but getting Corypheus’ general to straight up turn against him? Always struck a satisfied chord in those playthroughs.

She wasn’t a general right now, Mar decided, as she watched the class chuck snowball spells at each other. There was an impossible-to-fake happiness on Callie’s face. It occurred to Mar that she’d never had the chance to live a regular life among fellow mages. Not that many of them _did,_ but there were a lot of reasons she couldn’t tell apart Vints from Ferelden or Orlais or Marcher or anything.

They _were_ the same. Like Ghilya had been saying yesterday, they were all so much more similar than they were different. She was starting to understand how Callie could fit in so well, even with all the ways she didn’t.

How _she_ fit in, too. They were both outsiders accepted by a supportive group. They had more in common than not. And they both wanted, she’d bet, to just… have the same level of acceptance at home.

Her mind was drifting, but she was still staring at Callie, who laughed breathlessly while shaking snow out of her thin-spun blond locks. She caught her eye and held it. Mar didn’t look away. She instead smiled widely and leaned back against the wall of the Chantry. Callie looked at her friends, panting, then broke off and sauntered over to Mar, sliding down the wall to sit beside her.

“You like to stare,” Callie pointed out, still regaining her breath. “Some might consider it rude.”

Mar turned her head, fixing her with a direct look. “Do you?”

Her eyes slid over to meet her gaze, and another smile bloomed before she looked forward again. “Not at all.”

“Good.” They both sat and watched two of Lisa’s students spar. It was mesmerizing watching fire and lightning bend to a person’s will like ribbon dancing. “Where did you train?”

“Ostwick,” she said without hesitation.

“What brings you all the way to Redcliffe?”

“I’m supposed to meet a friend here. Our instructor sent us both to aid the rebellion however we could.” Her face remained the picture of innocence, placidly watching her classmates tumble. “I’m not sure when he’ll get here, so I may be waiting a while yet.”

Mar tilted her head, considering. A friend… “I hope he doesn’t find too much trouble on his way.”

“Alec can handle himself,” she said, no shortage of confidence in the words. Then, with an undercurrent of contempt, “At least, our instructor believes him capable. I doubt he’ll arrive until after the Conclave.”

Alec… ah.

Alexius.

He was trying to use his time magic to get to Redcliffe _before_ the Conclave, but there was no timeline in which that actually happened, to her knowledge.

They _really_ needed to work on their codenames.

“I’m sure he believes in your capability, too,” Mar offered, turning her head again to look at her. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”

Callie gave the barest of scoffs, a slow blink accompanying an eyeroll and a sardonic smile. “Unequivocally true, though it feels like he keeps me at arm’s reach.” Then, she shrugged. “But that’s neither here nor there. He wants what’s best for us.”

_He literally doesn’t._ “That’s good, then,” Mar responded, admiring the straight ridge of Callie’s nose. “It’s hard to find people who’re so genuine.”

Callie turned her head, smiling warmly. “You seem to attract them.” Mar became _fully aware_ of how close they were sitting, a hair’s breadth between their arms actually touching, their noses not a head’s distance away. She felt the air in her lungs vanish.

“They just keep finding me,” she replied, eyebrows lifting just a bit. A beat of something tense passed between them before Mar lolled her head forward against the bricks. “Must be ‘cause I’m so hot.”

A swell of pride as Callie sputtered a laugh, caught off guard. “If you expect me to disagree…”

“I don’t.” She smiled, cheeky, glancing at her. Callie’s eyes were alight, pupils tiny in the morning sun, an inner ring of hazel appearing within irises of emerald green. They wrinkled at the corners, a charming pair of crow’s feet emerging with a true grin. Mar hadn’t even noticed the emotional wall until it was gone.

“…I would be hard-pressed to do so. I dislike lying,” she said. Class was winding down, signaling her approaching departure.

Mar’s eyes danced back and forth between Callie’s. Searching, but not finding anything she couldn’t already see. Didn’t already know. Her smile waned, finding that she wished she didn’t.

“So do I.”

* * *

The rest of Mar’s week was spent in that giddy haze you get when someone you think is cute thinks you’re cute, too. Like she said, Callie was _Pretty._ It wasn’t that Lisa or Ghilya weren’t both gorgeous in their own right, but Mar kept coming back to “curated” in regards to Calpernia. Like the very structure of her face was an art gallery. The way she carried herself, so sure about every motion, every look, depicting a choreography known just to her, only cemented that notion, as well as inflaming Mar’s attraction towards her.

_Lord help me but I am BACK on that gay shit._

It hadn’t really crossed Mar’s mind that her libido would deign to reappear, given the general sort of existential stress she was under. She’d hardly given the lack of it much thought. But she’d long since started getting comfortable here, as much as it felt weird admitting it. The main reason she was vying to slip back to Earth was the looming apocalypse here that she had no idea how to avoid. If she was going to be completely honest, there was probably one looming on Earth, too, in the condition she remembered it being. Things were… bleak, for the most part, and it was taxing to imagine how much worse it needed to get before it got better.

At least here, she could get a hold of the person bound to bring everything down. Theoretically. And who knows, even if she changed nothing about the future, things may turn out alright anyways. Some protagonist would step forward and save the world from Solas. She didn’t _need_ to do anything, really.

But it wasn’t the fate of the world that weighed on her. Not really. In either universe, she knew the world would live on, that the survivors would adapt and rebuild. It’s how we were all wired.

It was Solas. It was him, the pain he was in, the dismal fate he was too eager to accept. She wasn’t exactly sure on the details of his plan, but Mar understood that he maybe didn’t plan on living through it. Maybe didn’t want to.

She knew the feeling too well to let him pay that price. Different circumstances, of course. It was the principle of the matter.

Mar was able to save herself. She couldn’t hope to save him, but she could try helping him do the same. After all, she wouldn’t have been able to without help from her own friends.

The most wistful mood descended upon her as she busked down by the docks on her next day off, sitting on a lone bench with a good distance between market stalls. She’d sent off a well-thought out response to Alistair, and now there was nothing to do but wait. A newfound attraction made her as excited as it did somber. How was it that Solas felt, when he realized he was falling for Lavellan? Or least was mildly attracted to her? That it wouldn’t end well was a given, but the side of him that said _fuck it_ and dove in headfirst anyways, where did that part start and where did it end? In a word, she’d guess it started at his personhood and ended at his duty. His responsibility to the world. Joining the Inquisition was the path towards that. Everything else was ignorable fluff, until it wasn’t.

What was _her_ duty? Mar’s fingers plucked out melodies half-heartedly, idle sounds to fill the air. _She_ wasn’t responsible for the state of the world. There was no discernible reason as to why she was here, just as there was none for why she was born on Earth. The meaning of life was to live it for the sake of living; she’d already decided that long ago. Death will come, as much a part of life as birth, so you might as well do some cool shit in the meantime. Make art, help people, love your friends and yourself. It was all very plain to her.

Solas was operating on the fact that Death didn’t necessarily _need_ to come. If you were immortal, you didn’t worry about having enough time. You were in an endless race against no one to just keep growing and living.

She realized she was playing one of Angie’s songs, one she wrote after Mar showed her _The Good Place._ It was a fantastic show that delved way deeper into morality and ethics than a network series should have any right to, but thank fuck it did, because it made a _phenomenal_ piece of media. (One that should be watched by anyone with any interest, right now at this moment immediately, thank you, you’re welcome.) It seriously even dealt with the dilemma of immortality, why mortality is such an intrinsic part of the personhood experience. The fact that anyone, _anyone,_ could make the choice to change at _any_ _time_ was another huge takeaway that Mar kept close to her heart. It was one of the reasons why she had even a modicum of belief that she could help Solas.

Substituting the words written by her long lost lover with _la-dee-dum’s_ , she understood it was also why she would keep Calpernia’s secret, just as she knew she’d keep Solas’ and, hell, even Blackwall’s. Why she wanted to be the one who could help. Was she trying to be a guardian angel type character? Just that random bartender that somehow _knew_ what you were trying to say when you weren’t even sure? She knew she could help. She knew she wanted to help. It’s all she ever felt like she wanted to do. Was that old leftover fawn trauma-responses, or just who she was? Did it make a difference either way?

As she ended the song with a little flourish, a silver landed in her banjo case. “Beautiful music,” a man commented quietly. She looked up from under her hood to smile at the generous passerby.

“Thank you, sir,” was all she managed to get out before she recognized Teagan Guerrin standing right there. Right goddamn there, not two paces away.

She schooled her facial features to remain unchanged, but she did swallow involuntarily. _Need to work on that._ He, for his part, simply smiled and _nearly_ kept walking, but then froze. His mouth turned downward, and he looked at her with the most _curious_ notch in his brow. Mar had a small inclination to hide under her hood and pretend she had _no_ clue who he was, since she shouldn’t, since they’d never met before, but not only did he bear a resemblance to his ingame model in Origins, she’d _seen him in her dreams._ It was him.

It almost started feeling like having foresight via video games was more useless than the shit she was experiencing _now._ Go fucking figure.

He searched for words, puzzling together the face to the memory, but coming up emptier than her flask on a Sunday night. She could outright state what he was thinking, but thought it better to coax his realization into verbalization. Mar smiled and said, “I find most people fail to put their coin where their mouth is when they claim to enjoy the arts. It really does help.”

His gingery brown locks were swept back impeccably. Not quite _Prince Charming-esque,_ with none of that careless dishevelment, but well-groomed and tidy. Teagan cleared his throat, eager to recover his speech. “I’ve never liked seeing a minstrel go underappreciated, especially not one of such talent.”

“Not so much talent, sir,” she said, “as simple hard work.”

“Work that deserves compensation,” he said, nodding once towards her case. The gears in his mind were clearly still grinding away as he shook his head and squinted mildly. “Forgive me, my lady, have we met before?”

“Not a lady, either, and no, we haven’t.” She stuck a hand out. “My name is Marlaina Andrade.”

It clicked into place, then, his face lighting up in the strangest way, some cocktail of relief and bewilderment. “Eamon spoke of The Hero’s spector reappearing, but…” An eyeballs-only up-and-down, blatantly drinking in her image. “It’s as if she’d stepped through time and sat on that bench, Ser Andrade.”

“‘Mar’ is fine, Lord…?”

“Teagan Guerrin, Arl of Redcliffe,” he introduced, taking her hand lightly. Ah, right, he’d been made Arl since the Blight ended, with Eamon off in Denerim. She didn’t see where Eamon had been during the ceremony, but it’d have been weirder if he _wasn’t_ in attendance. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mar.”

She inclined her head politely as he released her hand, replacing it where it rested on her banjo drum. “Any requests?”

The corner of his lip pulled up, warmth in his cheeks. “Play me something joyous.”

Her head leaned to one side, eyes up and inner cheek firmly between her molars. Shit, she only knew sad stuff. She wasn’t well-practiced at “happy,” but anything in like… C Major, probably, counted.

Practicing the chords, her fingers ended up strumming out a bluegrass _Come On Eileen_ by Dexys Midnight Runners, a classic bop _._ A couple walking by clapped along as they passed, giggling to themselves. She didn’t so much finish the song as peter out into a soft repetition of the melodies, slight variations here and there.

“I’ve never heard that one before.”

“I think it’s Marcher,” she said blithely.

“Funny thing,” Arl Teagan said. “One of the minstrels I invited to perform the Satinalia celebration in Redcliffe Castle can’t make it anymore.”

She grinned up at him. “That _is_ funny.”

“Would you care to fill that vacancy?” Arl Teagan regarded her with some calculated wonder. “The pay is adequate. We simply can’t have Satinalia without dancing.”

Mar wished she could say that she at least stopped to consider whether it was a good idea or not, but she nodded, enthusiastic and immediate. “I would be honored, Arl Teagan.”

* * *

She grilled the hurdy-gurdy player, a dwarf named Aran, on popular dance tunes as soon as she entered The Gull & Lantern. They had an honest-to-Void jam sesh, where he taught her some festive Ferelden dance songs and she showed him _Come On Eileen_ since that song was now hopelessly stuck in her head. The Lantern’s patrons were into it, some getting up to jig circles around each other. Some were looking through the bottom of their bottles, so to speak, so Mar and Aran kept it up, floating from one dance number to the next. She guided Aran through a Mountain Goats song aptly named _Dance Music,_ plucking out the bars for vocals and keys. _She_ didn’t mind shaking her hips to John Darnielle singing about his abusive stepfather, but that sense of ironic lyricism wouldn’t go over so smoothly here, so instrumental it was.

Feeling jovial herself, Mar was already a couple tankards deep, playing a folksy version of _Tainted Love,_ when Callie walked in, fittingly enough. Behind her trailed Ghilya in her dark blue robes, shimmying her shoulders to the beat, gleam of teeth appearing as she spotted Mar onstage. Callie’s eyes fell on her soon after, appraising. She threw a grin at them, finished up the set, and swiftly joined them at the bar.

“You’ll never guess who I met today,” she began. After relaying her meet-cute with Arl Teagan, congratulations were in order, resulting in another round. She was more than happy to indulge.

The conversation flowed with the people around them, jubilant and free. There was plenty to feel hopeful about, though Mar still had twists in her stomach trying not to think about the Conclave. Inevitably, it was a topic hard not to bring up.

“It’s odd to think anyone but seasoned professionals would attend,” Callie said, tipping the last ounce of red into her mouth. “Are you expected to participate, Ghilya?”

“Only to give a statement and let them dissect it.” She swirled her mug around, eyes glued to the ale swishing inside. “I would be devastated if I weren’t able to help.”

Mar finished a hearty gulp. “Don’t put too much pressure on yourself. That kind of situation can be difficult to control.”

She sipped then paused before speaking again. “I only have to think of the alternative to motivate myself.”

“Which is?” Callie pried.

“Tevinter. Have you not heard the rumors?”

For all Mar knew, Calpernia was the one _spreading_ the rumors, but to her credit, you wouldn’t be able to tell by the way her brows drew together and how genuinely confused she sounded. “Which ones?”

Ghilya looked past Mar to get a good look at Callie. “That if the Conclave fails, the mage’s last resort for freedom would be Tevinter, and there’s no way in the forsaken Void I’ll be around for that. All that lies down that path is a bondage I’ve worked to avoid my whole life.”

Mar leaned back as Callie firmly met her stare. “Not even as their equals?” An innocent enough question.

Her jaw set in a way Mar’d only really seen reserved for Denerim-era Lisa. “I wouldn’t trust it. Not for a second.”

“I can understand that,” Callie said, turning her attention back to her glass, newly refreshed. “But I don’t know if I would refuse so easily. A world where my power is allowed the basic respect it deserves sounds like one worth considering.” Just as she brought the glass to her lips, she glanced between the two of them. “Might be a world worth fixing from its own errors.”

Ghilya’s laugh came out a harsh huff. “If I were going to save a nation, it wouldn’t be _Tevinter._ I don’t care how prestigiously they treat mages, Minrathous can sink into the sea for all I care.”

“Has Minrathous offended you personally?” Callie asked cooly. Mar tried not to notice the tension held just beneath her skin, how her poised grip on the wine glass was anything but relaxed.

“Minrathous has my mother.” Ghilya’s posture was rod-straight, the sharpness of her wide-set catlike eyes not barbed specifically for Callie, but threatening to poke anyways. “If she even still lives. Haven’t seen her in ten years, doubt I will again.”

A couple painful moments of silence passed, Mar frozen to her chair, nursing her tankard steadily, eyes occupied with inspecting the bottles on the bar’s back shelf. “I’m sorry to hear that,” Callie said quietly.

She just shrugged. “Happens,” she said, then took a long draught of ale.

More uncomfortable silence ensued, filled only by the surrounding ambience and imbibing of booze. After she felt the awkwardness sort of pass, Mar broke it. “So, what do you wear to a Satinalia festival?”

“You’ve never been to one?” Ghilya asked.

Mar shook her head. “Grew up sheltered and never got a chance in adulthood.”

“I’ve never been, either,” Callie backed up. “It’s not so strange.”

Been to one in the South, she probably meant. It was a weird feeling, having a Tevinter spy on your side, helping each other lie. Mar was aware of it in ways that she knew Callie wasn’t.

They began talking about fashion, a decidedly safer topic to broach than mage politics. The night continued without much more fuss, slowing at a natural pace. Ghilya was the first to call it a night, leaving Mar and Callie at the end of the bar, not without a subtle wink Mar’s way. She couldn’t ask for a better wingman, she supposed.

The two of them sat in just a moment of silence after leaving before Callie brought it up. “I’m worried about Ghilya going to the Conclave.”

Mar, finishing two hearty gulps of ale — this one was _definitely_ her last for the night — eyed her. “Me too. I can’t help but feel like something’s gonna go horribly wrong.”

“Yes,” she breathed, eyebrows raising as she looked at Mar. “You think so too?”

Mar maintained eye contact as she nodded. “I haven’t been able to shake the feeling since it was announced.” Calpernia _had_ to be aware of Corypheus’ plan. They didn’t share a gut feeling, they shared knowledge of what was to transpire, but of course neither of them could say so outright. “But there’s no talking her out of it.”

“No, there isn’t.” Callie twisted her empty wine glass by the stem on the bar. She gnawed on her bottom lip, gaze growing distant in thought. “I wonder… if those rumors of a Tevinter alliance are true…”

As Mar waited for her to continue the thought, the bartender pointed at her empty tankard in question. _Okay, maybe one more._ She relented, wanting an excuse to linger if there was more of this conversation to be had. The froth was cool on her upper lip, her eyes patiently watching the cogs Callie’s mind grind.

“What was her mother’s name?” Callie asked.

“Serenna Kallas.” Ghilya had only mentioned it once in a story she told about growing up in the alienage. Mar was good with names, luckily.

“And she was taken during the Fifth Blight?”

Mar nodded. “Loghain Mac Tir had sold elves under the guise of a plague. I believe the magister involved was named Caladrius.” She hazarded a guess at Callie’s train of thought. “You think Tevinter could deliver her back to Ferelden?”

Callie tottered her head, dallying with the idea. “Possibly.” She remained quiet after that, completely focused on some plan formulating in her head.

It couldn’t hurt to fish a little. “I’m not overly familiar with Tevinter,” Mar admitted. “But it seems like they’d be reluctant to just let go of one of their slaves.”

“Of course.” A ghostly little smile spread across her face. “Usually they need to be stolen away, if they can’t be outright bought back.”

“Oh, well, if that’s all! Know any good breaker of chains?” Mar said in jest, poking her elbow at Callie, as it was an absurd thing to ask. As if Mar had no idea who she was talking to.

Callie just smiled, taking a long sip of her wine at the same time that Mar did her ale. “What are you going to play at Satinalia, minstrel?”

A convenient change of topic, but Mar let it go. They spoke easily, brainstorming folk songs, ones that Mar had heard in other taverns and ones that Callie had. Aran had retired for the night, so Mar took back the stage, made exceptionally easy with the blood alcohol content she was sure she’d clock. Again, it wasn’t that the ale was particularly strong, but she was _well-versed_ in the art of binging just enough to teeter between solidly drunk and incoherently plastered. She flubbed a few chords, occasionally going “Whoops” and continuing with the correct ones, liquid laughter bubbling up more often than it would in Sober Mar. She was probably a little closer to plastered. Anyone still in the tavern so late at night didn’t seem to mind, and Callie was just watching her, smiling, freckled cheeks rosy with the wine buzz she had going.

They left the tavern together, giggling about some offhand comment, her arm wrapped up in Callie’s. Mar had no clue how that happened, honest. She’d insisted on seeing Mar back to her room safely, and who was Mar to object to such a chivalrous gesture? They tripped down the hallway together in The Pigeonhole until arriving at her bedroom door, where the ale caught all the way up with Mar. She stumbled and threw a hand out to catch herself on the doorframe, vision spinning. Fortunately, Callie was there, catching her by the arms and fixing her into standing upright.

“Careful!” she laughed as Mar stabilized herself. “You okay?”

Her hand clung to Callie’s shoulder, anchoring itself as the wooziness passed. “Yeah, thanks,” she said, laughing until she looked up and found Callie’s face _oh SO close_ to hers.

Callie seemed to realize it at the same time, her eyes flicking down to Mar’s lips and back up. The moment crystalized into a snapshot, a beat amberized in thick tension. One of the hands on Mar rested against her cheek, into which Mar involuntarily leaned into the slightest bit. Shit. Yeah, she _really_ missed this.

The very next instant, their teeth clicked together in a flurry of kisses, the immediacy of it overpowering. Sharp sparks burst through Mar, mind and spirit captured by the softness of Callie’s lips, her hand squeezing her shoulder, the other traveling to pull her forward by the lower back. Flames licked down her spine, a maelstrom of nerves igniting in her core. The world around her spun from the combination of heat, alcohol, and the urgency with which Callie pressed the warmth of her body against Mar. _Closer,_ Mar thought, she wanted to be _closer._

Callie stopped suddenly and pulled back. The look in her eyes brokered between need and uncertainty. “I can’t…” she started. “This isn’t a good time for me to start anything serious.”

“I don’t need serious,” Mar responded, caught in a breathless daze. She waited until a gap-toothed grin appeared, until Callie dove back in to consume her whole, before fumbling with the door handle and falling backwards into the room.

* * *

Mar twirled the rose in her hand once, its blossom turned brittle and off-white with time. It had come from Lothering, a town they’d visited what seems like a lifetime ago.

“I wanted to give you this before the Landsmeet,” Alistair said, hard blush reddening his bronze cheeks. “Not to say it won’t go well, now that we have Eamon among the land of the living, but… well, in case I didn’t get a chance to after that.”

“It’s beautiful, Alistair,” she said, smiling at him. “Thank you.”

“It _is_ a little silly,” he continued, red creeping into the tips of his ears. “But I just… You’re always willing to listen to me, and I don’t think I’ve heard you complain even _once._ I saw it, and I thought of you, and… I just want you to know that I hold you in the highest regard.” He placed the gentlest of hands over hers, clasping tight. “You’re a rare, wonderful thing to find amidst all of this… destruction.”

The look in his eyes told her that he meant what he said, and that he meant it in a _very_ specific way. Her smile faltered.

“Alistair,” she said slowly. “I’m… the sentiment is appreciated, very much so, but…”

“I’m sorry,” he said, backpedalling immediately, hand dropping away. She missed its warmth. “I mean, not for how I feel, just… for bringing it up. Like this. But I needed you to know. Just so I can be honest with you. I don’t expect you to feel the same way.”

Alistair was halfway turned around when she reached out and touched his cheek, rose in hand, bringing him to face her again. The river flowing under the stone arched bridge and the songbirds flitting through the trees filled the silence between them. His eyes shined, captivated, as she pulled him closer, standing on her tiptoes, and pressed her lips softly to his other cheek, holding there for several seconds. When she pulled back, she said in Elvhen, _“My heart died long ago. If I could feel the same, I would.”_

“I have no idea what you said,” he murmured, replacing his hand over the one on his cheek. “But it sounded sad.”

“Didn’t you know?” Mar smiled again, giving a playful shake of her head. “Being sad is a prerequisite for the Joining.”

That got him to laugh, so she let her hand drop and they continued on their journey towards Denerim. “Sadness really _does_ pair well with the taste of Darkspawn blood, huh? Really brings out that savory flavor.”

She was about to laugh and add to the joke, but it suddenly occurred to her that she’d never tasted Darkspawn blood.

Just as before, the second she became aware she was dreaming, the scene fell away into an empty grey crag of fog and stone. Whispers surrounded her, bading her to look upwards, but a pricking at her finger caught her attention. She looked down to find that she was still holding the dried rose from the memory, the tip of her index running over one of its thorns, long and sharp.

There was then a presence before her, and when Mar looked up again, there was the same figure as before, glowing entirely silver. They were looking at the rose, so Mar held it up for them. When they extended a hand, she placed the flower in it, and watched as the same silver light enveloped it the second it left her touch.

_“Rare and wonderful.”_ They spoke in Elvhen, voice distorted again by static, but lullingly soft. They contemplated the object in their hand, forlorn. _“But my heart…”_ They looked back up, metaphorically making eye contact. _“I should be dead, too.”_

_“Who are you?”_ Mar asked, involuntarily in Elvhen as well. Huh. _“Why should you be dead?”_

_“I don’t know… but I am… not at peace,”_ they said, _“Nor am I at war.”_

The first rose petal fell onto Mar’s nose, making her recoil. Then, all around them, rose petals began falling, drifting down like a rain of feathers, white as snow. Same as all objects in motion here, their afterimages burnt into the air and faded behind them. The whispers fell into silence as they changed color, slowly phasing into a baby blue. They descended in sheets like a bubble around them until, finally, Mar looked around and could see nothing else but the figure and a firmament of blue rose petals, glowing with the same gentle pulsing.

There was no delay between the phrase entering her mind and Mar speaking it aloud. _“In peace, vigilance.”_

_“In war, victory.”_ They seemed to gasp, silver light growing in brightness. The shower of petals became a solid wall. It began to close in on them, shrinking the space, plush and unyielding.

Mar squinted as the figure grew brighter, then flashed, finally forcing her to close her eyes. _“In death—”_ She opened her eyes again as the light died, and found the final word on her lips dying with it.

In front of her, Mar saw herself — massive curly brown mane returned, though still elven, but no piercings, no tattoos — looking down at the dried white rose. When the double looked up, their eyes were completely filled with that same silver light. The falling petals began tumbling down Mar’s arms and back, caressing her as they piled at her feet.

_“Sacrifice,”_ her double said, unobscured by distortion — _God is_ that _what I sound like?_ — and then the petals smothered Mar into total darkness.

* * *

Mar jolted awake, shivering in a cold sweat, to find that Callie wasn’t in bed with her, but standing by her door, shrouded by her pale blonde hair, holding her bow up. In the stream of moonlight allowed by her tiny window, she could see her bewildered expression, intently inspecting the orb in the grip. When Callie noticed her shoot up in bed, panting, she jumped, almost dropping the bow.

“What are you doing?” Mar’s heart remained frenzied, panic coloring her tone.

“I woke up while you were having a nightmare, but I couldn’t wake you,” Callie replied, lifting the bow up. “Then this little piece in your bow started glowing. It just went out a second ago.”

Mar kept trying to catch her breath, reeling, eyes wide, unable to speak.

Callie leveled a look at her. “It was glowing bright silver.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> award for Fastest Burn also goes to meeee! thank you for reading, let me know what you think is going on bc it's starting to show Complexities and i'm hoping some things get across alright


End file.
